CORNACEiE 



713 



The generic name, from cornu, relates to the hardness of the wood produced by 

 plants of this family. 



CONSPECTUS OF THE ARBORESCENT SPECIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



Flowers greenish, in a dense cyraose head surrounded by a conspicuous corolla-like involucre 

 of 4-6 white or rarely red scales, frona terminal buds formed the previous summer ; fruit 

 ovoid, bright red. 



Heads of flower-buds inclosed by the involucre during the winter ; involucral scales 4, 



obcordate or notched at the apex ; leaves ovate to elliptical. 



1. C. florida (A, C). 



Heads of flower-buds not inclosed by the involucre during the winter ; involucral scales 



4-6, oblong to obovate, usually acute at the apex ; leaves ovate or rarely obovate. 



2. C. Nuttallii (B, G). 



Flowers cream color, in a flat cymose head, without involucral scales, terminal on shoots 



of the year ; fruit subglobose, white or dark blue. 



Leaves opposite, scabrous above ; fruit white. 3. C. asperifolia (A, C). 



Leaves mostly alternate and clustered at the ends of the branches, smooth above; 



fruit dark blue. 4. C. alternifolia (A, C). 



1. Cornus florida, L. Flowering Dogwood. 



Leaves ovate to elliptical or rarely slightly obovate, acute and often contracted 

 into slender points at the apex, gradually narrowed at the base, remotely and ob- 

 scurely crenulate-toothed on the somewhat thickened margins, and mostly clustered 

 at the ends of the branches, when they unfold pale and pubescent below and puberu- 

 lous above, and at maturity thick and firm, bright green and covered with minute 



appressed hairs on the upper surface, pale or sometimes almost white and more or 

 less pubescent on the lower surface, 3'-6Mong and 1^-2' wide, with prominent 

 light-colored midribs deeply impressed above, and 5 or 6 pairs of primary veins par- 

 allel with their sides and connected by obscure reticulate veinlets, in the autumn 

 turning bright scarlet on the upper surface; their petioles grooved, ^' |' long. 

 Flowers : head of flower-buds appearing during the summer between the upper 

 pair of lateral leaf-buds, inclosed by 4 involucral scales remaining light brown and 

 more or less covered with pale hairs during the winter and borne on a stout club- 

 shaped puberulous peduncle \' long or less during the winter and becoming I'-l^ 



