TIIK PINE LANDS. 115 



from its solitude, and to the wonderment of the observer pre- 

 sents a broad and beautiful river. 



Scattered throughout the pines are the remains of a once 

 famous industrj^ the manufacture of iron from bog ore, or 

 limonite. These ruins are seen in the vicinity of streams and 

 bogs. Much charcoal was consumed by these forges. With 

 their failure the manufacture of charcoal faded, and with it 

 the value of coal wood. But coal pits in active operation are 

 still in the pine belt. At Florence, in Camden County, a 

 large tract has recently been cleared, and the wood is being 

 used for charcoal purposes. 



Among the pines, then, we have not only swamps and 

 cranberry bogs, but villages, towns and farms. Cedar Brook 

 is a clearing among the pines ; so are Hammonton and Vine- 

 land. In Chemung Township, Burlington County, there is a 

 tract of a thousand acres, cleared and cultivated, right among 

 the pines. The soil is as noted for its fine agricultural pro- 

 ducts, as the surrounding forests are for the abundance and 

 variety of first class game. 



The genus Finns belongs to the gymnospermous, or naked 

 seeded family, the less abundant class of the exogens. The 

 true pines are readily distinguished by their leaves and their 

 cones. Their branches are whorled at regular intervals, and 

 bear needle-like leaves, united in groups of two, three or five 

 by a short sheath enclosing their base. The leaves remain on 

 the stem two or three years before falling. The flowers of the 

 pine are monoecious ; that is, male and female flowers are 

 found in separate catkins, but on the same tree. The males 

 occur in spikes at the base of the new shoots of the season, 

 and the females are solitary or in clusters at the ends of the 

 boughs. The fruit is not matured until the second year after 

 the flowers. The cone takes a year to ripen ; it is composed 

 of woody scales, thickening toward the top. Each scale of a 

 pine cone is an open pistil, bearing, on the inner side of its 

 base, two naked seeds, furnished with membranous wings, 

 which aid in th^ir disssmination. The wind is the agent by 



