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cream-colored and is always the more durable. Former difficulties in 
seasoning this wood have been overcome, so that now it makes a fairly 
good lumber for floor mouldings, wagon-box boards, furniture, and veneer 
and interior finish. Preservative treatment makes it valuable for railroad 
ties and it is also a good wood for paper pulp and charcoal for gun- 
powder. It is sometimes sold in Europe under the name of bay poplar. 
Nyssa sylvatica. Black Gum.—This tree is readily recognized by the 
fact that its leaves turn red or scarlet earlier than those of any other 
species, and that its branches come out almost at right angles to the stem. 
Its associates are about the same as those of the tupelo and its uses are 
similar. Its greatest economic development in Illinois is in its use for 
the manufacture of egg crates. Its wood is tough and fibrous, making 
it very hard to split, and it is not durable in the ground unless treated. It 
is one of the species which comes in great numbers after the logging of 
cypress, and men who have purchased land for cypress alone have found 
it becoming valuable on account of the spontaneous growth of black gum, 
tupelo, and red gum. 
Pinus echinata. Shortleaf Pine-——It may be a point of interest to 
botanists to know that there is a stand of shortleaf pine in Illinois on an 
area commonly referred to as the “pine hills,’ a ridge above Wolf Lake 
Station, and paralleling Wolf Lake. This is an old ox-bow lake fed by 
springs and too deep to be successfully drained. Its location is shown 
on our map, and one of the plates in this report shows the character of 
the stand of timber, as well as a log house which is built entirely of short- 
leaf-pine logs. Judge Karraker, of Jonesboro, tells us that at one time 
a considerable number of logs were cut on these hills and sawed into 
boards. The soil is a dry cherty loam and, largely because of fires, the 
timber is not spreading, although trees of pole size are found in many 
places. The species can be identified by the needles, which are only about 
half as long as those of the longleaf pine (Pinus palustris), and by the 
bark, which at maturity is scaly and yellowish red, in very pronounced 
irregular plates. The nearest out-state location of this species is in Mis- 
souri, where it is mixed with hardwoods—mostly white, red, black, and 
black-jack oak. 
Taxodium distichum. Bald Cypress—The bald cypress is of con- 
siderable importance in Hlinois, occurring in the bottoms of the Missis- 
sippi River, near McClure, and in those of the Cache River and the 
backwaters of the Ohio. In some small areas it occurs in pure stands; 
and elsewhere it is mixed with gums and other hardwoods. It has been 
rather closely culled out of the Cache River bottoms, the largest mill 
sawing cypress in quantities being that of Main Brothers, at Karnak, 
just outside this region. There is also a mill at Ullin belonging to the 
Defiance Box Company, of Defiance, Ohio, which saws some cypress into 
