46 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. ROSACEE. 
produced on slender glabrous or puberulous pedicels developed from the axils of minute scarious cadu- 
cous bracts, are borne in erect or ultimately spreading narrow many-flowered racemes, four to six inches 
in length, and appear when the leaves are about half grown, from the end of March in Texas and 
Louisiana to the first week of June in the valley of the St. Lawrence River. They are a quarter of an 
inch across when expanded, with a cup-shaped glabrous or puberulous calyx-tube and short ovate-oblong 
obtuse lobes, slightly laciniate on the margins, reflexed at maturity, and persistent with the stamens 
until after the falling of the fruit, pure white, broadly obovate petals, glabrous filaments and _pistil, 
and a thick club-shaped stigma. The fruit, which ripens from June to October, is depressed-globular, 
slightly lobed, from one third to one half of an inch in diameter, dark red when first fully grown and 
almost black when ripe, with a thick skin, dark purple juicy flesh of a pleasant vinous flavor, and 
oblong-obovate pointed thin-walled stones broadly,ridged on the ventral margin and acute on the other. 
Prunus serotina is distributed from Nova Scotia westward through the Canadian Provinces to the 
valley of the Kaministiquia River,’ southward through the eastern states to the shores of Matanzas Inlet 
and Tampa Bay, Florida, and westward to the valley of the Missouri River in Dakota, eastern Nebraska 
and Kansas, the Indian Territory and eastern Texas, along the mountain ranges of western Texas, south- 
ern New Mexico, and Arizona, and on those of Mexico and the Pacific regions of Central America, Co- 
lombia, and Peru. In the United States Prunus serotina grows usually in rich moist soil, and was once 
common in all the Appalachian region, where, associated with the White Oak, the White Ash, the Blue 
Ash, the Sugar Maple, the Yellow Buckeye, the Hickories, and the Black Birch, it was an important 
element of the forest, reaching its greatest size and beauty on the slopes of the high Alleghany Moun- 
tains from West Virginia to Georgia and Alabama; sometimes it grows on light sandy soil, and it may 
be found on the rocky cliffs of the New England coast within reach of the spray of the ocean; in the 
coast region of the southern states it is nowhere common, and does not attain a large size; and in the 
southwest it is confined to the bottoms of mountain cafions, at elevations between five thousand and 
seven thousand feet about the level of the sea, and rarely grows to a greater height than twenty or 
thirty feet.’ 
Prunus serotina is one of the most valuable timber trees of the American forests. The wood is 
light, strong, and rather hard, with a close straight grain and a satiny surface susceptible of receiving a 
beautiful polish ; it is light brown or red, with thin yellow sapwood composed of ten or twelve layers of 
1 Brunet, Cat. Pl. Can. 43.—Delamare, Renauld & Cardot, Fl. 
Miquelon. 18. — Macoun, Cat. Can. Pl. i. 126, 513. 
? Botanists have usually considered the Mexican Cherry-tree a 
distinct species, but it is impossible to find essential characters to 
distinguisl’ it from the northern species with which it is connected 
geographically through Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. The 
leaves of the Mexican tree are often narrowly lanceolate and acu- 
minate, but this character is by no means constant, and leaves of a 
similar form are not uncommon on northern trees. The persistent 
calyx-lobes which distinguish Prunus serotina from the other species 
of the section Padus are found on the southern as well as on the 
northern trees. The synonymy of the Mexican Cherry-tree is as fol- 
lows : — 
Prunus salicifolia, Humboldt, Bonpland & Kunth, Nov. Gen. et 
Spec. vi. 241, t. 563. — Kunth, Syn. Pl. Zquin. iii. 481. — Sprengel, 
Syst. ii, 478. — Hemsley, Bot. Biol. Am. Cent. i. 868. 
Cerasus Capollin, De Candolle, Prodr. ii. 589.— Don, Gen. Syst. 
ii. 515. — Loudon, Arb. Brit. ii. 713, £. 420. — Bentham, Pl. Hart- 
weg. 10.— Torrey & Gray, Fl. N. Am. i. 412. —Gray, Smithsonian 
Contrib. v. 54 (Pl. Wright. ii.). 
Cerasus salicifolia, De Candolle, Prodr. ii. 540, — Spach, Hist. 
Veg. i. 422. — Don, Gen. Syst. ii. 516. 
Cerasus Capuli, Seringe ; De Candolle, Prodr. ii. 541, — Don, 
Gen. Syst. ii. 516.— Spach, Hist. Véq. i. 422. 
Prunus Capuli, Cavanilles ; Sprengel, Syst. ii. 477. — Schlechten- 
dal, Linnea, xiii. 89, 404. — Koch, Dendr. i. 123.— Hemsley, Bot.. 
Biol. Am. Cent. i. 367. — Watson, Proc. Am. Acad. xvii. 352. 
Prunus Capulin, Zuccarini, Abhand. Akad. Miinch. ii. 345, t. 8. — 
Roemer, Fam. Nat. Syn. iii. 87.— Torrey, Bot. Mex. Bound. Surv. 
62, — Rusby, Bull. Torrey Bot. Club, ix. 53. 
Prunus Canadensis, Mocino & Sessé, Pl. Mex. Icon. ined. 
Laurocerasus salicifolia, Roemer, Fam. Nat. Syn. iii. 89. 
Prunus salicifolia, var. acutifolia, Watson, Proc. Am. Acad. xxii. 411. 
As is generally the case with individual trees grown in dry cli- 
mates, the wood of the New Mexican Cherry is considerably heavier 
than the average of several specimens from trees which had grown 
in other parts of the United States, the specific gravity of the 
absolutely dry wood being 0.7879, and a cubic foot weighing 49.10 
pounds. The Mexican Cherry is supposed to be an inhabitant of 
French gardens (Rev. Hort. 1884, 111; 1891, 62, f. 19, 20; 196. — 
Lavallée, Arb. Segrez. 115, t. 34), but as the plants which resemble 
in every respect the Wild Cherries of the east are perfectly hardy 
in the neighborhood of Paris and in the Arnold Arboretum, which 
received them from France, they are probably of more northern 
origin than the French horticulturists believe. In the elevated 
regions of western South America the Mexican Cherry is occasion- 
ally planted as a fruit-tree in the neighborhood of dwellings (Ed. 
André, L’Amérique Equinoxiale [Le Tour du Monde, xxxiv. 46]). 
