STUDIES OF TREES IN WINTER 



White ^ small tree, with a rough bark, 



Mulberry small, round brown buds, and 

 Momsaiba small projecting alternate leaf- 

 scars with clearly defined bundle-scars. The 

 buds are smaller and more rounded than those 

 of the red mulberry. It is easily distinguished 

 from the red mulberry by its more numerous 

 and slender shoots. 



Professor Charles S. Sargent says that no 

 other tree furnishes employment, directly and 

 indirectly, to so large a number of the human 

 race, or has been so carefully studied from the 

 cultural point of view, and no other tree has 

 given rise to such a voluminous literature as 

 the white mulberry. 



It was introduced here from China about 

 1830, and it has been widely cultivated and 

 naturalized throughout the United States. The 

 Chinese were the first to cultivate the mulberry 

 for feeding silkworms, and they are said to 

 have discovered the art of making silk 2700 

 years b. c. According to Loudon the discovery 

 is due to the keen powers of observation of the 

 Empress Si-ling-chi, who watched the labors of 

 silkworms on wild mulberry trees, and who first 

 applied their silk to use. It is interesting to 

 associate the making of silk with an empress 



who loved nature and used her eyes two thou- 



124 



