728 TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



scarious, persistent; corolla ovoid-urceolate, white, 5-toothecl, the teeth obtuse and 

 recurved; stamens 10, shorter than the corolla; filaments subulate, dilated and pilose 

 at the base, free, inserted in the bottom of the corolla; anthers short, compressed 

 laterally, dorsally 2-awned, the cells opening at the top internally by a terminal 

 pore; ovary glandular-roughened, glabrous or tomentose, sessile or slightly immersed 

 in the glandular 10-lobed disk, 5 or rarely 4-celled; style columnar, simple, exserted; 

 stigma obscurely 5-lobed; ovules attached to a central placenta developed from the 

 inner angle of each cell, amphitropous. Fruit drupaceous, globose, smooth or gland- 

 ular-coated, 5-celled, many-seeded; flesh dry and mealy; stone cartilaginous, often 

 incompletely developed. Seeds small, compressed or angled, narrowed and often 

 apiculate at the apex; seed-coat coriaceous, dark red-brown, slightly pilose; embryo 

 axile in copious horny albumen, clavate; radicle terete, erect, turned toward the hilum. 



Arbutus with ten or twelve species inhabits southern and western North America, 

 Central America, eastern, southern, and southwestern Europe, Asia Minor, northern 

 Africa, and the Canary Islands. Three species occur within the territory of the 

 United States. Arbutus produces hard close-grained valuable wood often made into 

 charcoal, used in the manufacture of gunpowder. The fruit possesses narcotic pro- 

 perties, and the bark and leaves are astringent. 



Arbutus is the classical name of the species of southern Europe. 



CONSPECTUS OF THE SPECIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



Bark of old trunks dark red-brown. 



Ovary glabrous; leaves oval or oblong", entire or serrate. 1. A. Menziesii (B, G). 



Ovary pubescent ; leaves oval, ovate, or lanceolate. 2. A. Xalapensis (C). 



Bark of old trunks ashy gray ; ovary glabrous, conspicuously porulose ; leaves lanceolate or 



rarely narrowly oblong. 3. A. Arizonica (H), 



1. Arbutus Menziesii, Pursh. Madrona. 



Leaves oval or oblong, rounded or contracted into short points at the apex, and 

 rounded, subcordate, or wedge-shaped at the base, with slightly thickened revolute 

 entire or occasionally on young plants sharply serrate margins, when they unfold 

 light green or often pink, especially on the lower surface, and glabrous or slightly 

 puberulous, and at maturity thick and coriaceous, dark green and lustrous above, 

 pale or often nearly white below, 3-5' long, l|'-3' wide, with thick pale midribs and 

 conspicuously reticulated veinlets, persistent until midsummer of their second year 

 and then turning orange and scarlet and falling gradually and irregularly; their 

 petioles stout, grooved, ^'-V long, often slightly wing-margined toward the apex. 

 Flowers about ^' long, with glabrous ovaries, appearing from March to May on 

 short slender puberulous pedicels from the axils of acute scarious bracts ciliate on 

 the margins, in spicate pubescent racemes forming a terminal cluster 5'-6' long and 

 broad. Fruit ripening in the autumn, subglobose or occasionally obovate or oval, 

 I' long, bright orange-red, with thin glandular flesh and a 5-celled more or less per- 

 fectly developed thin-walled cartilaginous stone; seeds several in each cell, tightly 

 pressed together and angled, dark brown and pilose. 



A tree, 80-100 high, with a tall straight trunk 4-7 in diameter, stout upright 

 or spreading branches forming a narrow oblong or broad round-topped head, and 

 slender branchlets light red, pea-green, or orange-colored and glabrous when they first 

 appear, or on vigorous young plants sometimes covered with pale scattered deciduous 

 hairs, becoming in their first winter bright reddish brown. Winter-buds obtuse, ^' 



