94 SYLVA AMERICANA. 



It usually attains the height of 40 or 50 feet, and a diameter 

 of 12 or 16 inches at three feet from the ground. Its trunk is 

 more tapering than the black spruce, and like which is a regular 

 pyramid, but less branching and tufted. The bark is lighter 

 colored, and the difference is more striking upon the young 

 shoots. The leaves are of a pale, bluish green, whence is derived 

 its specific name alba, about four lines in length, encompassing 

 the branches like the black species, but less numerous, more 

 pointed and at a more open angle with the branches. It flowers 

 in May or June, which are succeeded by reddish cones of a 

 lengthened oval form, about two inches in one direction, and six 

 or eight lines in the other : the dimensions vary according to the 

 vigor of the tree, but the form is unchangeable. The scales are 

 loose and thin, with entire edges, unlike those of the black 

 spruce. The seeds, also, are rather smaller, and are ripe about 

 the end of autumn. 



The wood is employed for the same uses as the black spruce 

 which will be hereafter described ; it is, however, inferior in 

 quality, and snaps more frequently in burning. The fibres of 

 the roots, macerated in water, are very flexible and tough ; being 

 deprived in the operation of their pellicle, they are used in 

 Canada to stitch together their canoes of birch bark, the seams 

 of which are afterwards smeared with a resin that distils from 

 the tree. The bark is sometimes used in tanning, though much 

 inferior to the hemlock spruce. The branches are not used for 

 beer, because the leaves when bruised diffuse an unpleasant odor, 

 which they are said to communicate to the liquid. The resin 

 of this tree is composed of a fragrant essential oil, and probably 

 containing sylvic or pinic acid. It is solid, dry, brittle, of a pale 

 yellowish brown color, frequently intermixed with white streaks 

 and whitish when broken. Medicinally it is a stimulant and 

 rubefacient, and is employed externally in form of plaster in 

 chronic catarrh, hooping cough, rheumatic pains, etc. 



