380 DECIDUOUS TREES. 



foliage in many kinds give out a delicious, though faint perfume. 

 Even the blossoms which hang like brown tassels from the droop- 

 ing branches, are interesting to the lover of nature. 



" ' The fragrant birch above him hung, 



Her tassels in the sky, 

 And many a vernal blossom sprung, 

 And nodded careless by.' BRYANT. 



" Nothing can well be prettier, seen from the windows of the 

 drawing-room, than a large group of trees, whose depth and dis- 

 tance is made up by the heavy and deep masses of the ash, oak, 

 and maple ; and the portions nearest to the eye on the lawn ter- 

 minated by a few birches, with their sparkling white stems and 

 delicate, airy, drooping foliage. Our white birch, being a small 

 tree, is very handsome in such situations, and offers the most pleas- 

 ing variety to the eye, when seen in connection with other foliage. 

 Several kinds, as the yellow and the black birches, are really stately 

 trees and form fine groups by themselves. Indeed, most beautiful 

 and varied masses might be formed by collecting together all the 

 different kinds, with their characteristic barks, branches, and 

 foliage. 



"As an additional recommendation, many of these trees grow 

 on the thinnest and most indifferent soils, whether moist or dry; 

 and in cold bleak and exposed situations, as well as in warm and 

 sheltered places." 



We shall enumerate the different kinds as follows : 



"THE CANOE BIRCH OR PAPER BIRCH, B. 

 papyracea or Boleau a canot of the French Cana- 

 dians, is, according to Michaux, most common 

 in the forests of the eastern States, north of 

 latitude 43, and in the Canadas. There it 

 attains its largest size, sometimes seventy feet in 

 height and three in diameter. Its branches are 

 slender, flexible, covered with a shining brown 

 bark, dotted with white ; and on trees of mode- 

 rate size, the bark is a brilliant white ; it is often 

 used for roofing houses, for the manufacture of baskets, boxes, etc., 



