Laurus sassafras, 
THE SASSAFRAS-TREE. 
Synonymes. 
Laurus sassafras, 
Laurier sassafras, Laurier des Iroquois, 
Sassafras-Lorberbaum, 
Sassofrasso, 
Sassafras-tree, Saxifax-tree, 
iLiNN.us, Species Plantarum. 
Michaux, North American Sylva. 
Loudon, Arboretum Britanuicum. 
France. 
Germany. 
Italy. 
Britain and Anglo- America. 
Derivation. The specific name sassafras, is an alteration of the Spanish word salsafras, or saxifras, which is applied to a 
species of Saxifraga, the virtues of which are attributed by the Spanish Americans to this tree. 
Engravings. Michaux, North American Sylva, pi. 81 ; Bigelow, Medical Botany, pi. 35; Audubon, Birds of America, iii. 
pi. cxliv. ; Jxmdon, Arboretum Britannicum, vii., pi. 218 et 219 ; and the figures below. 
Specific Characters. Sexes dioecious. Habit arborescent. Both leaves and flowers are produced from 
the same buds. Buds, younger branches, and the under surface of the leaves, pubescent. Leaves 
entire, or with 23 lobes. Veins prominent on the under side. Flowers in corymbose conglomerate 
racemes. Anthers with 4 unequal cells. In the female flower, additionally to the pistil, are 6 gland- 
like bodies, like those of the male flowers. Nuttall, Genera. 
Description. 
"If Fever's fervid rage 
Glowed in the boiling veins, with care they "****# 
*****" Freely urg'd 
The cool aperient from the fragrant hark 
Of Sassafras " ***** 
***** "To supply 
The place of fam'd Cinchona, whose rough brow 
Now ruddy, and anon with paleness mark'd, 
Drinks in its native bed, the genial gales 
Of mountainous Peru." 
Traits of the Aborigines. 
HE Laurus sassafras, in fa- 
fi!S h H jj| vourable situations, some- 
k LI |3> times attains a height of fifty 
ife/sSll or sixty feet, with a trunk 
from one to two feet in diameter ; but ordinarily it 
does not much exceed one half of these dimensions. 
The bark of the trunk is of a grayish colour, and is 
deeply furrowed; and that of the young branches is 
smooth, and of a beautiful reddish-green. On cut- 
ting into the cortex or true bark, it exhibits a dark, 
dull-red, much resembling the colour of the Peru- 
vian bark. The trees, when old, often give birth to 
numerous suckers, that spring up at little distances 
from their trunks, which rarely rise higher than six 
or eight feet. The leaves of the sassafras are four 
or five inches in length, alternate and petiolated. 
At their unfolding, in spring, they are downy, and 
of a tender texture; but become smoother, and 
more firm by age. They are remarkable for the variety of their forms on the 
same tree. " Those which proceed first from the bud, are usually oval and 
entire ; the next have the same form, with a lobe on one side ; and the last, and 
