COTTON-FRUITED MAPLE. 97 



in seasoning, loses nearly half of its weight. It is sometimes used in cabinet- 

 making, instead of the holly or other light-coloured wood, for inlaying furniture 

 of mahogany, cherry-tree, and black walnut ; though it is less suitable for this 

 purpose, as it soon changes colour by exposure to light. Wooden bowls are also 

 made of it, when that of ash, or tulip-tree cannot be obtained. The charcoal of 

 this wood is preferred by hatters and dyers to every other, as it affords a heat 

 more miiform, and of longer duration. The sap is in motion earlier in this spe- 

 cies than in the sugar maple, beginning to ascend, in the middle states, about 

 the 15th of January ; so that, when it is employed for making sugar, the opera- 

 tions are sooner completed. Like the sap of the red-flowered maple, it yields not 

 more than one half the product of sugar, from a given measure, as that of the 

 Acer saccharinum. Its inner bark produces a black precipitate with copperas, 

 (sulphate of iron,) and is sometimes employed in domestic dyeing. 



The Acer eriocarpum is highly prized as an ornamental tree, both in Europe 

 and America, on account of the rapidity of its growth, the graceful, divergent 

 direction of its branches, the beauty of its leaves, and the profusion of its early 

 flowers. It is admirably adapted for overspreading artificial ponds, or other 

 waters, with a mirror-like surface, where the lover of nature can calmly admire 

 the brilliant white of the leaves beneath, which he may pleasingly contrast with 

 the bright-green above. 



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