CHAPTER TWELVE 



THE TULIP TREE 



I care not how men trace their ancestry, 



To ape or Adam ; let them please their whim ; 



But I in June am midway to believe 



A tree among my far progenitors, 



Such sympathy is mine with all the race, 



Such mutual recognition vaguely sweet 



There is between us. Surely there are times 



When they consent to own me of their kin, 



And condescend to me, and call me cousin. 



LOWELL 



THE grandest tree of the Appalachian forest and the 

 Middle states belongs to the Magnolia family and is 

 known as the tulip tree. The members of this family 

 have large, showy flowers, very different from the in- 

 conspicuous flowers of most of our forest trees. Many 

 tulip trees have been found that are more than 130 

 feet tall. They grow in the forests from southern Ver- 

 mont to northern Florida and west to the Mississippi 

 River. In the mountains of Tennessee and North 

 Carolina specimens with magnificent straight trunks 

 7 or 8 feet in diameter may be found, and the early 

 settlers west of the Appalachians found many of these 

 trees with tall, clean trunks 4 to 6 feet in diameter. 



Leaf, fruit, and flower. You can tell a tulip tree by 

 its peculiar leaf, which looks as if the tip had been cut 

 off, or by its fruit, which is a sort of cone, not hanging 

 but standing upright. In the course of the winter the 

 scales of the cone fall, leaving the central axis still stand- 

 ing. In the base of each scale is a seed, and the scale 

 serves as a parachute to carry the seed away. 



The yellowish green flowers, tipped with orange, are 



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