12 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. CORNACE. 
Mountains ; they are cream-color, with an oblong cup-shaped obscurely toothed calyx coated with hoary 
tomentum, narrow oblong corolla-lobes which are rounded at the apex, an eighth of an inch long and 
reflexed after anthesis, long slender filaments with nodding anthers, and a columnar style with a 
prominent stigma. The fruit is borne in loose spreading red-stemmed clusters and ripens in October ; 
it is subglobose, dark blue-black, a third of an inch across, and tipped with the remnant of the style, 
which rises from the bottom of a small depression ; the nutlet, which is covered with a thin coat of dry 
bitter flesh, is obovoid, pointed at the base, longitudinally many-grooved, thick-walled, and one or two- 
seeded. The seed is lunate, compressed, and a quarter of an inch long, with a thin membranaceous pale 
coat and copious albumen. 
Cornus alternifolia is distributed from New Brunswick and Nova Scotia westward along the 
valley of the St. Lawrence River to the northern shores of Lake Superior’ and Minnesota, and 
southward through the northern states, and along the Alleghany Mountains to northern Georgia and 
Alabama. It is a common inhabitant of rich woodlands, growing usually along the margins of the 
forest and by the borders of streams and swamps in moist well-drained soil. 
The wood of Cornus alternifolia is heavy, hard, and close-grained, with numerous thin medullary 
rays, and is brown tinged with red, with thick light-colored sapwood composed of twenty to thirty 
layers of annual growth. The specific gravity of the absolutely dry wood is 0.6696, a cubic foot 
weighing 41.73 pounds. 
Cornus alternifolia, which was overlooked by the early botanists in North America, was cultivated 
in England by James Gordon’ in 1760.° The peculiar habit of this species with its wide-spreading 
branches and flat-topped head, its handsome foliage, and abundant flowers and fruit make it a desirable 
ornament for parks and gardens, although in cultivation it is often injured by fungal diseases. 
1 Macoun, Cat. Can. Pl. i. 192, 538. 8 Aiton, Hort. Kew. 1. 159.— Loudon, Arb. Brit. ii. 1010, £. 760. 
2 See i. 30. 
EXPLANATION OF THE PLATE. 
Puate CCXVI. Cornus ALTERNIFOLIA. 
. A flowering branch, natural size. 
. Diagram of a flower. 
. Vertical section of a flower, enlarged. 
A flower with the petals and stamens removed, cut crosswise, enlarged. 
An ovule, much magnified. 
. A fruiting branch, natural size. 
. Cross section of a fruit, enlarged. 
. Vertical section of a fruit, enlarged. 
WO WONAMD AP wo dod 
. A nutlet, enlarged. 
_ 
fon) 
. An embryo, much magnified. 
— 
f—_ 
. End of a winter branchlet, natural size. 
