THE POPLARS. 125 



aspen has a whitish foliage without a suspicion of 

 shininess. Along the banks of the Pemigewasset 

 Kiver, and in the adjacent woodlands, this tree, with 

 its ever-trembling leaves, is a very familiar object. 

 Its smooth, greenish trunk is cut by the lumbermen 

 into short, round logs, which are sent to neighbor- 

 ing mills and ground by powerful machinery, with 

 the aid of water, into a soft pulp ; this is pressed 

 into paste-boardlike layers, in which preparatory 

 condition it is sent to various factories for the man- 

 ufacture not only of paper but of an infinite variety 

 of useful objects, such as pails, stove-mats, wash- 

 tubs, boxes, trays, etc. 



L t th d *^ ne l ar g e -toothed aspen has a larger 



Aspen, and coarser leaf than that of the 



Populus variety just described, and its outline 



grandidentata. . , 



is roundish and irregularly wavy. 

 There are, perhaps, only seventeen coarse teeth to 

 each leaf, and these are very dull-pointed. The leaf 

 stems are also flat and long ; in fact, the large-toothed 

 aspen has leaves of nearly the same character as those 

 of its more beautiful relative, but lacking the pretty 

 heart-shape. The leaf is large, however, from three 

 to five inches long, smooth on both sides when old, but 

 covered with down when quite young. The tree is 

 common in the North, but rare southward, except in 

 the Alleghanies. It grows from 40 to 80 feet high, 



