806 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



transparent resin, known as Canada balsam, is collected by Indians and poor whites 

 in the province of Quebec. This resin, which was formerly largely used in medicine 

 on account of its stimulating action on the mucous membrane, is now chiefly used for 

 mounting objects to be examined under the microscope, for which, and kindred 

 purposes.it is specially suitable by reason of its transparency. (H. J. E.) 



ABIES FRASERI, Southern Balsam Fir 



Abies Fraseri, Poiret, in Lamarck, Diet. Suppl.s. 35 (181 7); Forbes, Pinetum Woburnense, III, 

 t. 38 (1840) ; Sargent, Silva N. Amer. xii. 105, t. 609 (1898), and Trees N. Amer. 57 (1905); 

 Masters, Gard. Chron. viil 684, fig. 132 (1890); Kent, Veitch's Man. Conifera, 509 (1900). 



Pinus Fraseri, Lambert, Genus Pinus, ii. t. 42 (1837). 



Picea Fraseri, Loudon, Arb. ft Frut. Brit. iv. 2340 (1838). 



A tree attaining in America 70 feet in height and 7 feet in girth, with rather 

 rigid branches, forming an open symmetrical pyramid. Bark smooth and with 

 numerous blisters in young trees, becoming on older trunks covered with thin 

 appressed reddish scales. Buds small, broadly ovoid or globose, reddish, resinous. 

 Young shoots smooth, yellowish grey, densely covered with reddish, short, twisted 

 or curved hairs, the pubescence being retained on the older branchlets. 



Leaves on lateral branches pectinately arranged, as in A. balsamea ; linear, flat- 

 tened, shorter than in that species, rarely exceeding f inch long and ^Vj inch broad, 

 uniform in width except at the shortly tapering base, rounded and bifid at the apex ; 

 upper surface dark green, shining, with a continuous median groove and without 

 stomata ; lower surface with two broad conspicuously white bands of stomata, each 

 of eight to twelve lines ; resin-canals median. Leaves on cone-bearing shoots 

 upturned, crowded, broader than on barren shoots, rounded and entire at the apex. 



Staminate flowers yellow tinged with red. Pistillate flowers, with rounded 

 scales, shorter than the oblong bracts, which are broad and rounded above, ending 

 in long slender tips. 



Cones sub-sessile, ovoid, cylindrical, slightly tapering at the base and towards 

 the rounded or flattened apex, purple, about 2 inches long by \\ inch in diameter, 

 with the bracts conspicuously exserted and reflected. Scales as in A. balsamea, but 

 wider in proportion to their length. Bracts ; claw oblong ; lamina broad, trapezoidal, 

 denticulate in margin and bifid above with a mucro in the emargination. Seed with 

 wing about \ inch long ; wing purplish, broadly trapezoidal, denticulate in the upper 

 margin, about twice as long as the body of the seed. 



Identification 



This species can readily be distinguished from Abies balsamea by the different 

 pubescence on the young branchlets and the shorter, more coriaceous leaves, which 



Logs with this so-called " glassy " appearance are occasionally rejected ; but examination showed that this peculiarity was 

 simply due to the presence of ice, which follows the radial lines on the healed-over branches of the logs. 



