53 



since in that case it would have been more widely 

 thstributed than it is. 



The Norway maple, A. plaiaiioichs, was intro- 

 duced within the Eighteenth Centur}-. The foliage 

 of this variety is not so massive as that of the 

 sycamore. It grows more rapidl}' at first, but does 

 not attain the same size. 



The common maple, A. campcstrc, is the onl}- 

 truly -acknowledged indigenous Acer in Great 

 Britain. It takes the same shape of growth as 

 the sycamore in a more diminutive form, seldom 

 growing to more than twenty or twenty-five feet 

 high, and with its leaves and flowers all smaller 

 in proportion. Two characteristic distindions are 

 that the flowers are partly ereft, whereas in the 

 sycamore they are drooping, and that the bark 

 of the young growth, at first light brown and 

 rugged, becomes smooth and a dark mottled 

 brown as the tree grows older. 



When it is not interfered with, the common 

 maple is a very pidfuresque objeCt. We have no 

 tree that in colouring surpasses the autumn tint 

 of its dying leaves. It is not found growing as 

 a tree so extensively as the sycamore, but is 

 very familiar to us in our hedgerows, and as 

 coppice wood. It makes good hurdles and stakes. 

 Although it does not come to sufficient size for 

 large timbers, maple wood is hard, and being 

 beautifully veined and susceptible to a high 



