56 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. BETULACES. 
usually solitary or rarely in pairs, vary during the winter from an inch and a quarter to an inch and a 
half in length and are about an eighth of an inch thick; and when fully grown and the flowers open in 
early spring they are from two and a half to four and a half inches long, with ovate acute apiculate 
scales. The pistillate aments are slender and about half an inch long, with ovate acute pale green 
glandular scales, and are raised on slender glandular peduncles almost a third of an inch in length and 
furnished near the middle and toward the apex with conspicuous ovate acute scarious bractlets. The 
strobiles are cylindrical, obtuse at the apex, and about three quarters of an inch long, and hang upon 
slender peduncles of about the same length ; the scales, which are usually broader than long, are coated 
on the back with thick pale pubescence, and are cuneate at the base, with broad diverging lateral lobes. 
The nut is oval or obovate, acute or rounded at the base, and furnished with obovate wings rather 
broader than the seed. 
Betula populifolia, which is the smallest and least widely distributed of the Birch-trees of eastern 
North America, inhabits Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and the valley of the lower St. Lawrence River,! 
and ranges southward, usually in the neighborhood of the coast, to Newcastle County, Delaware, and 
westward through northern New England and New York, ascending sometimes to altitudes of eighteen 
hundred feet above the level of the sea, to the southern shores of Lake Ontario. Rare and compara- 
tively local in the interior, the Gray Birch, which grows on dry gravelly barren soil, or sometimes, 
especially in southern New England and southward, on the moist margins of swamps and ponds, is 
extremely abundant in the coast regions of New England and the middle states, springing up profusely 
on abandoned farm lands and on those which have been stripped by fire of their forest covering. 
The wood of Betula populifolia is light, soft, not strong, close-grained, liable to check badly in 
drying, and not durable in contact with the ground ; it is ight brown, with thick nearly white sapwood, 
and contains numerous obscure medullary rays. The specific gravity of the absolutely dry wood is 
0.5760, a cubic foot weighing 35.90 pounds. It is largely used in the manufacture of spools, shoe-pegs, 
and wood-pulp, and for the hoops of barrels. It makes excellent fuel, burning with a clear bright 
flame, the resinous bark igniting quickly. 
Betula populifolia,’ with its pale bark and its lustrous leaves fluttering on their long stems as 
freely as those of the Aspen, is an interesting and sometimes a picturesque object. The short life of 
this tree, however, and the flexibility of its slender trunks, which are often bent to the ground and 
injured by ice and snow, make it one of the least desirable of American trees for the decoration of 
parks ; and its greatest utility lies in its power to spring up profusely and grow rapidly in sterile soil 
and in the protection it affords to the seedlings of more valuable but more slowly growing trees. 
1 Brunet, Cat. Vég. Lig. Can. 52.— Macoun, Cat. Can. Pl. 436. ? Betula populifolia is also sometimes called Old Field Birch. 
EXPLANATION OF THE PLATE. 
PuateE CCCCL. BEruna PoPpuLIFOLia. 
1. A flowering branch, natural size. 7. Scale of a fruiting ament, enlarged. 
2. Scale of a staminate ament, rear view, enlarged. 8. A nut, enlarged. 
3. Scale of a staminate ament with bract and bractlets, the 9. An embryo, enlarged. 
flowers removed, enlarged. 10. A winter branch with staminate ament, natural size. 
4. A stamen, enlarged. 11. A sterile winter-bud, enlarged. 
5. Pistillate flowers with their scale, front view, enlarged. 12. The end of a branch with unfolding leaves and stipules, 
6. A fruiting branch, natural size. natural size. 
