247. PlCEA. ENGELMANNI ENGELMANN SPRUCE. 49 



from British Columbia southward to central New Mexico and Arizona 

 and also the Blue and Cascade Mountains of Washington and Oregon 

 nearly to the Californian line. It ranges between the altitudes of two 

 thousand three hundred and five thousand feet in the north to from 

 nine thousand to eleven thousand five hundred feet in the south 

 forming extensive tracts of beautiful and valuable forests on manj 

 mountains and said to attain its most stately development north of the 

 United States boundary. 



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

 and yielding a beautiful satiny surface when polished. It is of a pale 

 yellow-brown color, darkest near the center of the log and with slightly 

 lighter colored sap-wood. Specific Gravity, 0.3449; Percentage of 

 Ash, 0.32; Relative Approximate Fuel Value, 0.3438; Coefficient of 

 Elasticity, 80791; Modulus of Rupture, 574; Resistance to Longi- 

 tudinal Pressure, 267; Resistance to Indentation, 76; Weight of a 

 Cubic Foot in Pounds, 21.49. 



USES. A valuable timber for general construction purposes, the 

 building of houses, etc. It is also used largely for fuel and charcoal. 

 No doubt when the supply of eastern woods becomes more reduced 

 this species may largely contribute material for sounding boards for 

 musical instruments and pulp for paper-making. The bark is suffici- 

 ently rich in tannin to cause its employment in localities for tanning 

 purposes. 



GENUS ABIES, LINK. 



Leaves sessile, short, solitary, usually more or less flattened and entire, with 

 circular and not prominent 'bases, often emarginate, more or less two-ranked 

 especially on the horizontal branches and young trees by a twist near the base, 

 bearing stomata usually only below, with two resin ducts ; brarchlets smooth, 

 bearing the more or less circular not prominent leaf scars Flowers from the 

 axils of last year's leaves ; the staminate borne in abundance along the under 

 side of the branchlets, oblong or cylindrical, with short stipes surrounded by 

 numerous bud scales ; anther-cells two, extrorse, opening transversly, the con- 

 nective terminating in a knob ; pollen grains large with two air sacs ; pistillate 

 flowers erect, with bracts larger than the scales ; ovules two, adnate to the inner 

 side of each scale near the base. Cones erect upon the upper branches and matur- 

 ing the first year, sessile, nearly cylindrical, with numerous spirally arranged, 

 imbricated, carpellary scales, each in the axil of a thin membranous bract which 

 with the scale falls away at maturity from the persistent axis ; seed covered with 

 resin- vesicles and each bearing a membranous wing, the base of which covers 

 the outer and laps over upon the inner surface ; cotyledons 4 to 10. 



Trees of about sixteen or eighteen species, generally of remarkable pyramidal 

 growth, confined to the northern hemisphere of both continents and represented 

 in the United States by nine species mostly on the Pacific Slope. (Abies is the 

 ancient Latin name of the Fir.) 



