224 SYLVA AMERICANA. 



loblolly bay and the water oak, it has a pyramidical base 

 resembling a sugar loaf. A trunk 18 or 20 feet high and seven 

 or eight inches in diameter at the surface, is only two or three 

 inches thick a foot from the ground ; these proportions, however, 

 vary in different individuals. 



The black gum is much superior in size to the tupelo, being 

 frequently 60 or 70 feet in height and 18 or 20 inches in 

 diameter. The bark of the trunk is whitish and similar to that 

 of the white oak. The leaves are five or six inches long, 

 alternate, entire, of an elongated, oval form, and borne by short 

 and downy petioles. The flowers open in April or May, are 

 small, not conspicuous, and collected in bunches. The fruit is 

 of a deep blue color, and of a lengthened oval shape, and contains 

 a slightly convex stone, longitudinally striated on both sides. 



The wood of this tree is fine-grained but tender, and its fibres 

 are interwoven and collected in bundles, an arrangement 

 characteristic of the genus. The alburnum of stocks growing 

 upon dry and elevated lands is yellow. Throughout the greater 

 part of Virginia this wood is employed for the naves of coach 

 and waggon wheels : at Richmond, Baltimore, Philadelphia, etc. 

 it is preferred for hatters' blocks, as being less liable to split : in 

 the Southern States it is used in the rice mills for the cylinder 

 which receives the cogs : it is also chosen by shipwrights for the 

 cap, or the piece which receives the topmast. 



