306 BIRCH FAMILY. 



1. MYRICA, BAYBERRY, SWEET GALE. (Ancient name of some 

 aromatic shrub.) Fl. spring, with or earlier than the leaves. 



M. GMe, Sweet Gale. Cold bogs N. : l°-4° high, with pale wedge- 

 lanceolate leaves, serrate towards the apex ; little nuts crowded, and as if 

 winged by a pair of scales. 



M. cerifera, Bayberry, Wax-Myrtle. Along the coast : shrub 2° -8° 

 high, with fragrant lance-oblong or lanceolate mostly entire leaves, becoming 

 glossy above, the scattered bony nuts thickly incrusted with greenish or white 

 wax and appearing like berries. 



2. COMPTONIA, SWEET-FERN. (Named for Henry Compton, a 

 bishop of London.) Flowers rather later than the leaves, in spring. 



C. asplenifdlia, the only species, in sterile rocky soil, chiefly E. : 10-2° 

 high, with linear-lanceolate downy leaves pinnatifid into many short and rounded 

 lobes, resembling a Fern, and sweet-aromatic. 



108. BETULACEJE, BIRCH FAMILY. 



Trees or shrubs, often resinous-sprinkled and aromatic, with al- 

 ternate, simple, mostly straight-veined leaves, commonly deciduous 

 stipules, and monoecious flowers, both kinds in scaly catkins, and 2 

 or 3 under each bract. Ovary 2-celled and 2-ovuled, but the fruit 

 (a little nut or akene often surrounded by a wing like a samara) 

 1 -celled and 1-seeded. Stigmas 2, thread-like. 



1. BETULA. Sterile catkins long and hanging: 3 flowers under each shield- 



shaped scaly bract, each with a scale bearing 4 short stamens with 1-celled 

 anthers. Fertile catkins stout: 2 or 3 flowers under each 3-lobed bract, each 

 of a naked ovary ripening into a rounded broadly winged scale-like little key- 

 fruit, tipped with the 2 stigmas. 



2. ALNUS. Flowers much as in Betula: but usually a distinct 3-5-parted calyx; 



anthers 2-celled; oval fertile catkins composed of thick and at length 

 woody persistent scales; and the little nutlets less winged or wingless. 



1. BETULA, BIRCH. (The ancient Latin name.) Trees with slender 

 spray (or a few low shrubs), more or less spicy-aromatic twigs, sessile scaly 

 buds, flowers in early spring along with the leaves ; the sterile catkins golden 

 yellow ; the fertile ones mostly terminating very short 2-leaved branches of 

 the season. The following arc all native trees. 



* Trunk with brown or ye/low-grai/ bark, the inner and the twigs and thin straight- 



veined leaves spicy-aromatic : petioles short : thick fruiting calkins with 

 their thin scales rather persistent : fruit with narrow wing. 



B. 16nta, Sweet, Black, or Cherry Birch. Moist woods mostly N. : 

 a rather large tree, with fine-grained valuable wood, dark brown close bark on 

 the trunk (not peeling in thin layers) and bronze-reddish twigs, very aromatic ; 

 leaves oblong-ovate and somewhat heart-shaped, sharply doubly serrate all round, 

 soon glossy above and almost smooth ; fruiting catkins oblong-cylindrical. 



B. Itltea, Yellow or Gray B. With the other and more northward : 

 less aromatic ; bark of trunk yellowish-gray and somewhat silvery, separating 

 in filmy layers ; leaves duller, more downy, and rarely at all heart-shaped ; 

 fruiting catkins short-oblong. 



* * Trunk with chalky-white bark peeling horizontally in thin sheets : leaves and 



narrow cylindrical smooth catkins slender-stalked: bracts falling loith the 

 broad-winged frnit. 

 B. ilba, var. populif61ia, American White Birch. Small tree in low 

 or sterile soil, from I'cnn. N. E., 15°- 2.5° high, with triangular very taper- 

 pointed smooth and glossy leaves. 



B. papyrkcea, Paper or Canoe Birch. Large tree, from upper part of 

 Pcnn. N., mostly far N. ; with more ovate and even heart-shaped leaves (dull 



