38 8ILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. conifers. 



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limits of its range, reaching an average maximum height o£ sixty or seventy feet and an average 

 trunk, diameter of two feet. The long comparatively thick limhs sweep out in graceful upward curves 

 and form a broad-based and rather open irregular pyramid which is often obtuse at the apex, and 

 are densely clothed with stout rigid pendent lateral branches, the ultimate branchlets frequently 

 incurving from near the middle. The bark of the trunk is from one quarter to one half of an inch 

 in thickness, and separates irregularly into thin plate-like scales which are light gray more or less 

 tino-ed with brown on the surface. The branchlets are stout, pale gray-green when they first appear, 

 and glabrous or slightly puberulous;* during their first autumn and winter they are orange-brown 

 and then gradually grow darker and grayish brown. The winter-buds, which are broadly ovate and 

 obtuse, are covered by light chestnut-brown scales rounded at the apex, with thin often reflexed cihate 

 margins, and vary from an eighth to nearly a quarter of an inch in length according to the vigor and 

 stoutness of the branchlets. The leaves are crowded on the upper side of the branches by the twisting 

 of those on the lower side, and point forward, especially those near the extremities of the branchlets; 

 they are tetragonal, incurved, and acute or acuminate at the apex, which terminates in a rigid callous 



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tip, and are pale blue and hoary when they first appear, becoming dark blue-green or pale blue at 

 maturity, individual trees varying greatly in the depth and brightness of the shades of blue of their 

 foliage ; they are marked on each of the four sides with three or four rows of stomata, and are from 



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one third of an inch in length on fertile upper branches to three quarters of an inch in length on the 

 lower sterile branches of young and vigorous trees. The staminate flowers are oblong-cylindrical and 

 pale red when they first emerge from the buds, but soon appear yellow from their thick covering of 

 pollen ; they are from one half to three quarters of an inch in length at maturity, when they are 

 suspended on slender pedicels nearly half an inch long. The pistillate flowers are oblong-cylindrical, 

 with round nearly entire pale red or yellow-green scales broader than they are long, and nearly orbicular 

 denticulate bracts. The cones, which are nearly sessile or are borne on very short thin straight stems, 

 are oblong-cylindrical, slender, slightly narrowed to both ends and rather obtuse at the apex, and are 

 usually about two inches long and from one third to two thirds of an inch in diameter, but vary from 

 an inch to two inches and a half in length ; their scales are nearly orbicular or somewhat longer than 

 they are broad, rounded, truncate, slightly emarginate or rarely narrowed at the apex, and obscurely 

 striate, with thin usually entire margins ; when fully grown they are pale green, often somewhat 

 tinged with red,^ and at maturity they become pale brown and lustrous, and are so thin and flexible 

 that the dry cone is easily compressed between the fingers without injuring the scales ; they generally 

 fall in the autumn or during the following winter, soon after the escape of the seeds. These are 

 about an eighth of an inch in length and pale brown, with narrow wings which gradually broaden 

 from the base to above the middle and are very oblique at the apex. 



The White Spruce inhabits the banks of streams and lakes and the borders of swamps, in rich 

 moist alluvial soil, ocean cliffs, and less commonly at the north the rocky slopes of low hills; it 

 ranges from the shores of Ungava Bay in Labrador westward to those of Hudson Bay, and from the 

 mouth of Seal River not far to the north of Cape Churchill it is scattered along the northern frontier 

 of the forest nearly to the shores of the Arctic Sea, and, crossing the continental divide, reaches 

 Behring Strait in 66° 44' north latitude. Southward it extends down the Atlantic coast to southern 

 Maine,^ growing often close to the shore, where it is constantly bathed in the spray of the ocean, 

 and to northern New Hampshire, northeastern Vermont, northern New York, northern Michigan * and 

 Minnesota and the Black Hills of Dakota, and through the interior of Alaska and along the Rocky 

 Mountains to northern Montana. 



1 lu the interior of Alaska and in British Columbia the branch- 3 On the coast of Maine Picea Canadensis grows as far south as 

 lets of the Wliite Spruce are sometinaes slightly puberulous; in the the shores of Casco Bay. (See Garden and Forest, ix. 351, f. 47.) 

 east the branchlets appear to be always entirely glabrous. ■* In the southern peninsula of Michigan, Picea Canadensis is 



2 In a swamp near BanfB, Alberta, I have seen in August White common on the Au Sable River and northward (teste W. J. Beal). 

 Spruce trees bearing bright red cones and others pale green coaes. 



