Ii6 PICE.^, OR SPRUCE TREES 



The Picea Rubra 's leaves on closer investigation are 

 more densely crowded ; they are also very remarkably 

 incurved, while those of the Common Spruce point 

 in a very distinctly upward attitude. Here is a very 

 telling difference, but a still more telling one is the 

 dense pubescence on the P. Rubra branches, white 

 on the young shoots and brown on the older branch- 

 lets. The P. Excelsa here and there shows evidence 

 of a few scattered downy tufts on the young stems, 

 and this wears off considerably on older branchlets. 

 But these scattered tufts of minute pubescence 

 present a very marked difference of appearance from 

 the dense down of thorough-going pubescent speci- 

 mens. Here is an unmistakable difference and a 

 lesson easily learnt. The cones differ entirely, as the 

 table, p. 281, shows, but cones are not very forth- 

 coming ; if they were, many identifying difficulties 

 would vanish. 



As the P. Rubra is a very rare tree, and only a few 

 can have seen its cones growing, I make no apology 

 for volunteering this home experience of them. I 

 have before me a branch taken from the top of a 

 specimen grown here, and planted about 1845 {vide 

 Elwes and Henry, vol. vi. p. 1379), and which is now 

 nearly 80 ft. high. It tapers to a point and is about 

 a foot broad in its widest part. In some 18 inches 

 length of this little arrangement of branch and 

 branchlets there are collected together some eighty 

 cones, sessile in character, and as pendulous in 

 position as they can contrive to be in their over- 

 crowded dwelling sphere. If you wish further to 

 dissociate these two trees Rubra and Excelsa, the 

 buds will help you. If you look at the buds of the 

 Rubra, and also of the P. Nigra, which in common 

 shares this peculiar characteristic, it will be seen that 

 their terminal buds are enveloped, for more than 

 from head to foot, with long, narrow-pointed, hairy 



