44 HOUGH'S AMERICAN WOODS. 



at apex, dark, densely clothed with crisp white hairs and persistent; stamens two, 

 yellow, three times the length of the scale, with glabrous filaments untied below 

 the middle; ovary narrow with long tapering point, dark green, glabrous, with 

 short style and broad stigmas Fruit capsules about ^ in. long, oblong-ovoid, 

 light brown, smooth, acuminate with short pedicel. 



(The specific name is from the Greek A.a6ioS, hairy, and XETtiS, scale.) 



A tree occasionally attaining the height of 30 ft. (10 in.), with loose 

 open head, and trunk 18 in. (0.45 in.) in diameter, vested in an ash- 

 gray, rather firm bark checked into irregular, longitudinal and obliquely 

 connecting ridges. To the northward in its range and at high eleva- 

 tions it is reduced to a shrub. 



HABITAT. California generally, along the banks of streams and in 

 moist low lands, ascending the western slopes of the Sierra Nevada 

 Mountains to the height of three or four thousand feet. In its 

 shrubby form it is found in Lower California and among the mountains 

 of Arizona. 



PHYSICAL PROPERTIES. Wood light, soft, not strong, close-grained, 

 with evenly distributed fine ducts and numerous fine medullary rays. 

 It is of a light-brown color with abundant pinkish- white sap- wood , 

 nearly white near the bark and gradually redder towards the center. 

 Specific Gravity, 0.5587; Percentage of Ash, 0.98; Relative Approx- 

 imate Fuel Value, 0.5532; Coefficient of Elasticity, 88778; Modulus 

 of Rupture, 813; Resistance to Longitudinal Pressure, 385; Resist- 

 ance to Indentation, 140; Weight of a Cubic Foot in Pounds, 34.82. 



USES. Considerably used for fuel in southern California. 



MEDICINAL PROPERTIES of an astringent and tonic nature are com- 

 mon to the genus and mentioned of the Salix nigra, Part II., pp. 



O/> Qf7 



oo-o/. 



GYMNOSPERM^. 



Flowering, exogenous plants with leaves chiefly paralled- veined and cotyledons 

 frequently more than two. Flowers diclinous and very incomplete; pistil repre- 

 sented by an open scale or leaf, or altogether wanting, with ovules naked, fertil- 

 ized by direct contact with the pollen, and seeds at maturity naked without a 

 true pericarp. 



ORDER CONIFER2E : PINE FAMILY. 



Leaves mostly awl-shaped or needle-shaped, evergreen, entire and parallel- 

 veined. Flowers monoecious, or rarely dioecious, in. catkins or cones, destitute 

 of both calyx and corolla; stamens one or several (usually united); ovary, style 

 and stigma wanting; ovules one or several at the base of a scale, which serves as 

 a carpel, or on an open disk. Fruit a cone, woody and with distinct scales, or 

 somewhat berry-like, and with fleshy coherent scales, seeds orthotopous, embryo 

 in the axis of the albumen. 



Trees or shrubs with a resinous juice. 



GENUS CUPRESSUS, TOURNEFORT. 



Leaves persistent, small, scale-like, decussately opposite, thick, rounded or 

 keeled, adnate to and decurrent upon the stem, usually glandular-pitted on the 



