56 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. OLEACEE. 
numerous arcuate veins connected by obscure reticulate veinlets. The flowers appear in February and 
March, the males and females being borne on different trees, and are produced in short or ultimately 
elongated panicles inclosed in the bud by chestnut-brown pubescent scales. The bracts are obovate, a 
third of an inch long, rounded at the apex, and coated with rusty pubescence. The staminate flower 
consists of a minute or nearly obsolete calyx, and of two or sometimes of four stamens with slender 
filaments and linear apiculate anthers. In the pistillate flower the deeply divided and laciniate cup- 
shaped calyx is as long as the ovary, which is gradually narrowed into an elongated slender style two- 
lobed and stigmatic at the apex. The fruit is elliptical, obovate or spatulate, frequently three-winged, 
surrounded at the base by the persistent calyx, and often marked on the two faces by a conspicuous 
impressed midvein; the broad thin wing, which is many-nerved, acute, and rounded or emarginate at 
the apex, surrounds the short compressed body, and is usually narrowed below into a stalk-like base. 
Fraxinus Caroliniana inhabits the coast region of the Atlantic and Gulf states from southern 
Virginia to Cape Canaveral and the Caloosa River in Florida and the valley of the Sabine River in 
Texas, ranging northward through western Louisiana to southwestern Arkansas, and occurring also on 
the island of Cuba.’ In the United States it grows always in deep often almost impassable river-swamps, 
inundated during several months of every year, under the shade of the Bald Cypress, the Red Maple, 
the Cotton Gum, the Water Oak, and the Liquidamber. 
The wood of Fraxinus Caroliniana is light, soft, weak, close-grained, with remote obscure medul- 
lary rays and ducts; it is nearly white sometimes tinged with yellow, with thick lighter colored sapwood. 
The specific gravity of the absolutely dry wood is 0.3541, a cubic foot weighing 22.07 pounds. 
The first description of Fraxinus Caroliniana was published in 1731 by Mark Catesby in the 
Natural History of Carolina? Although introduced by Catesby into English gardens in 1724,’ the 
Water Ash, which is the smallest and the least valuable of the eastern species, probably cannot be found 
now beyond the limits of its native swamps. 
1 Fraxinus Caroliniana, a form with comparatively narrow-winged Fraxinus Caroliniana, latiort fructu, Miller, Dict. No. 6. — Duha- 
fruit, was discovered in western Cuba by Mr. Charles Wright in mel, Traité des Arbres, i. 248. 
1865. (See Grisebach, Cat. Pl. Cub. 170 (Frazinus Cubensis).) Frazinus floridana, foliis angustioribus utrinque acuminatis pendulis, 
2 Fraxinus Carolinensis, foliis angustioribus utrinque acuminatis Romans, Nat. Hist. Florida, 26. 
pendulis, i. 80, t. 80. * Miller, Dict. ed. 8, No. 6. — Loudon, Arb. Brit. ii. 1238, £. 1063, 
1064 (Fraxinus platycarpa). 
EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES. 
PuateE CCLXXIV. Fraxtnus CAROLINIANA. 
A flowering branch of the staminate tree, natural size. 
. A flowering branch of the pistillate tree, natural size. 
and 4. Staminate flowers, enlarged. 
. A pistillate flower, enlarged. 
Puate CCLXXV. Fraxmus CAROLINIANA. 
. A fruiting branch, natural size. 
Vertical section of a fruit, natural size. 
A seed, natural size. 
. A leaf, natural size. 
or WON 
. A winter branchlet, natural size. 
