114 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. LEGUMINOSZ. 
more valuable than the wood of any other tree of the lower Rio Grande valley, and is sometimes 
manufactured into lumber, although the large trunks are often hollow or defective. 
Leucena pulverulenta was discovered by Jean Louis Berlandier’ in Nuevo Leon in 1830. It is 
the most beautiful of the Mimosa-like trees which grow naturally within the territory of the United 
States, and has occasionally been planted for shade and ornament in the towns of the lower Rio Grande 
valley, which it decorates with its handsome trunks, graceful feathery foliage, and abundant flowers. In 
cultivation it grows with great rapidity ;? and it may be expected to flourish in southern Europe, where 
it was introduced in 1889 through the Arnold Arboretum, in southern California, and other warm 
countries. 
1 See i. 82. than twenty-five years ago are thirty or forty feet high, with fine 
2 In Matamoras trees believed to have been planted not more spreading tops. 
EXPLANATION OF THE PLATE. 
Piate CXL. Lrvuc#Nna PULVERULENTA. 
- A flowering branch, natural size. 
A portion of a head of flowers, slightly enlarged. 
A flower with its bractlet, enlarged. 
. A pistil, enlarged. 
Vertical section of an ovary, enlarged. 
A cluster of legumes, natural size. 
. A portion of a legume, one of the valves removed, natural size. 
. Vertical section of a seed, enlarged. 
WOARDN Pwd 
. An embryo, magnified. 
