128 



SYLVA AMERICANA. 



It prospers in almost every soil and exposure, except in places 

 that are too long inundated, or that are absolutely sterile. 



The ordinary stature of this tree is from 12 to 15 feet, and it 

 is sometimes 25 or 30 feet high and six inches in diameter. Its 

 leaves are oval-acuminate and finely denticulated. The sexes 

 are united on the same stock, and the fertile flowers are collected 

 in long, loose, pendulous, leafy aments at the extremity of the 

 branches. The scales or leaves which surround them are 

 furnished at the base with a hard, oval seed. It flowers in May 

 or June. The fructification is always abundant, and the aments 

 remain attached to the tree long after the foliage is shed. The 

 bark of the trunk is smooth and spotted with white. 



The wood is white and exceedingly compact and fine-grained. 

 The dimensions of the tree are so small as to render it almost 

 useless even for fuel, but it is employed for hoops when better 

 species cannot be obtained. 



Iron Wood. Carpinus ostrya- 



East of the Mississippi 

 the Iron Wood is diffused 

 throughout the United States 

 and New Brunswick, Nova 

 Scotia and Lower Canada. 

 In New York, New Jersey, 

 Pennsylvania and the South- 

 ern States, where it is the 

 most abundant, it bears the 

 name of Iron Wood; in 

 Vermont, New Hampshire 

 and Maine, it is called Lever 

 Wood ; and by the French 

 of Illinois, Bois dur, hard 

 wood. Though this wood 

 is multiplied in the forests, 

 it nowhere constitutes masses 



even of inconsiderable extent, but is loosely disseminated, and 



found only in cool, fertile, shaded situations. 



Fig. 



PLATE XVI. 

 A leaf. Fig. 2. The fruit. 



