ANACARDIACEE. SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 23 
RHUS VERNIX. 
Poison Dogwood. Poison Sumach. 
FLOWERS dicecious, in axillary panicles. 
Leaves 7 to 13-foliolate. 
Fruit globular, white; the stone striate. 
Rhus Vernix, Linnzus, Spec. 265.— Medicus, Bot. Beob. 
1782, 223. — Marshall, Arbust. Am. 130. — Wangenheim, 
Toxicodendron pinnatum, Miller, Dict. ed. 8, No. 4. 
R. venenata, De Candolle, Prodr. ii. 68. — Hooker, £7. 
Nordam. Holz. 92. — Castiglioni, Viag. negli Stati Uniti, 
ii. 356, t. 14. — Plenck, Icon. t. 234. — Lamarck, J7J. ii. 
346, t. 207, £. 2.— Willdenow, Spec. i. 1479; Enum. 
323. — Schkuhr, Handb. i. 236. — Michaux, Fl. Bor.-Am. 
i. 183. — Nouveau Duhamel, ii. 165. — Persoon, Syn. i. 
324. — Desfontaines, Hist. Arb. ii. 325. — Poiret, Lam. 
Dict. vii. 505. — Bigelow, Fl. Boston. 72. — Nuttall, 
Gen. i. 203. — Pursh, #7. Am. Sept. i. 205. — Roemer & 
Schultes, Syst. vi. 646. — Hayne, Dendr. Fl. 34. — 
Elliott, Sk. i. 362.—Sprengel, Syst. i. 936. 
Bor.-Am. i. 126.— Don, Gen. Syst. ii. 71. — Spach, 
Hist. Vég. ii. 215. — Torrey & Gray, Fl. N. Am. i. 218, 
681. — Dietrich, Syn. ii. 1003.— Torrey, Fl. N. Y. i. 
130.— Emerson, Trees Mass. ed. 2, ii. 575, t. — Darling- 
ton, Fl. Cestr. ed. 3, 44.— Chapman, FZ. 69. — Curtis, 
Rep. Geolog. Surv. N. Car. 1860, iii. 93. — Bailey, Am. 
Nat. vii. 5, £. 3. — Engler, De Candolle Monogr. Phaner. 
iv. 397. — Sargent, Forest Trees N. Am. 10th Census 
U. S. ix. 54.— Watson & Coulter, Gruy’s Man. ed. 6, 
119. 
A small tree, with acrid poisonous juice turning black on exposure, occasionally twenty or twenty- 
five feet in height, with a trunk five or six inches in diameter, and slender rather pendulous branches 
forming a narrow round head; or more often a shrub sending up from the ground a cluster of slender 
stems. The bark of the trunk is thin, smooth, or sometimes slightly striate and pale light gray in color. 
The branchlets are glabrous when they appear, reddish brown and covered with minute orange-colored 
lenticular spots ; they are orange-brown at the end of the first season, and a year later are light gray and 
still marked by lenticels and by large elevated conspicuous leaf-scars. The winter-buds are acute and 
covered with dark purple scales puberulous on the back and margins with short pale hairs; the terminal 
bud varies from an eighth of an inch to nearly an inch in length and is two or three times larger than 
The leaves are from seven to fourteen inches in length, and are borne on slender 
The leaflets are 
obovate-oblong with entire revolute margins, and are slightly unequal at the base and contracted at the 
the axillary buds. 
petioles which are usually light red or red streaked with green on the upper side. 
acute or rounded apex; they are short-petiolulate with the exception of the terminal one, which is 
sometimes raised on a stalk an inch in length. The leaflets when they unfold are bright orange-colored 
and coated, especially on the margins and under surface, with fine pubescence; they soon become 
glabrous, and at maturity are three or four inches long and an inch and a half or two inches broad, 
dark green and lustrous on the upper surface and pale on the lower, with prominent midribs scarlet 
above, primary veins forking near the margin, and conspicuous reticulated veinlets. In October they 
turn to brilliant scarlet or orange and scarlet colors. The staminate and pistillate flowers are produced 
on different plants in long narrow axillary pubescent panicles aggregated near the ends of the branches. 
The bracts and bractlets are acute, pubescent, and early deciduous. ‘The pedicels are slender, pubescent, 
and bibracteate near the middle. 
green acute petals, which are erect and slightly reflexed towards the apex. The stamens are nearly 
The calyx-lobes are acute and a third of the length of the yellow- 
twice as long as the petals, with slender filaments and large orange-colored anthers; in the fertile 
flower they are not more than half the length of the petals, with small rudimentary anthers. The 
ovary is ovoid-globose and surmounted by three short thick spreading styles terminating in large 
capitate stigmas. The flowers appear late in June or early in July. The fruit ripens in September 
and often hangs on the branches until the following spring; it is produced in long graceful racemes 
