COTTON-FRUITED MAPLE. 97 
in seasoning, loses nearly half of its weight. It is sometimes used in cabinet- 
making, instead of the holly or other light-coloured wood, for inlaying furniture 
}f mahogany, cherry-tree, and black walnut ; though it is less suitable for this 
purpose, as it soon changes colour by exposure to light. Wooden bowls are also 
made of it, when that of ash, or tulip-tree cannot be obtained. The charcoal of 
this wood is preferred by hatters and dyers to every other, as it affords a heat 
more uniform, and of longer duration. The sap is in motion earlier in this spe- 
3ies than in the sugar maple, beginning to ascend, in the middle states, about 
the 15th of January ; so that, when it is employed for making sugar, the opera- 
tions are sooner completed. Like the sap of the red-flowered maple, it yields not 
more than one half the product of sugar, from a given measure, as that of the 
icer saccharinum. Its inner bark produces a black precipitate with copperas, 
[sulphate of iron,) and is sometimes employed in domestic dyeing. 
The Acer eriocarpum is highly prized as an ornamental tree, both in Europe 
ind America, on account of the rapidity of its growth, the graceful, divergent 
lirection of its branches, the beauty of its leaves, and the profusion of its early 
lowers. It is admirably adapted for overspreading artificial ponds, or other 
wraters, with a mirror-like surface, where the lover of nature can calmly admire 
the brilliant white of the leaves beneath, which he may pleasingly contrast with 
the bright-green above. 
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