652 



TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



base with a 2-lobed villose scale. Fruit conspicuously keeled ou the back, short- 

 oblong, about I' long, with thin light yellow translucent tlesh; seeds obovate, dark 

 brown, 



A tree, rarely more than 25-30 high, with a trunk sometimes 1 in diameter, 

 and stout pale brown or ultimately ashy gray branchlets. 



Distribution. Coast of Florida from the mouth of the St. John River and Cedar 

 Keys southward; rare and still imperfectly known. 



3. Sapindus Drummondi, Hook. & Arn. Soapberry. Wild China-tree. 



Leaves appearing in March and April, with slender grooved puberulous rachises, 

 without wings, and 4-9 pairs of alternate obliquely lanceolate acuminate leaflets, 



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glabrous on the upper and covered with short pale pubescence on the lower surface, 

 rather coriaceous, prominently reticulate-venulose, pale yellow-green, 2'-3' long, 

 ^'-|' wide, short-petiolulate, deciduous in the autumn or early winter. Flo"wers 

 appearing in May and June in clusters 6'-9' long and 5'-6' wide, with pubescent 

 many-angled stems and branches; sepals acute and concave, ciliate on the margins, 

 much shorter than the white obovate petals rounded at the apex, contracted into 

 long claws, hairy on the inner surface and furnished at the base with a deeply cleft 

 scale hairy on the margins; filaments hairy, with long soft hairs. Fruit ripening in 

 September and October, persistent on the branches until the following spring, gla- 

 brous, not keeled, yellow, ^' in diameter, turning black in drying; seeds obovate, 

 dark brown. 



A tree, 40-50 high, with a trunk sometimes ll-2 in diameter, usually erect 

 branches and branchlets at first slightly many-angled, pale yellow-green, pubescent, 

 becoming in their second year terete, pale gray, slightly puberulous, and marked by 

 numerous small lenticels. Bark of the trunk ^'^' thick, separating by deep fissures 

 into long narrow plates broken on the surface into small red-brown scales. Wood 

 heavy, strong, close-grained, light brown tinged with yellow, with lighter colored 

 sap wood of about 30 layers of annual growth; splitting easily into thin strips and 

 largely used in the manufacture of baskets used in harvesting cotton, and for the 

 frames of pack-saddles. 



Distribution. Moist claj'^ soil or dry limestone uplands; western Louisiana to the 



