HOUGH'S AMERICAN WOODS. 



2-3 in. in length ; calyx cup-shaped with 5 rounded lobes ; stamens rather longer 

 than calyx-lobes ; with slender yellow filaments and orange anthers ; pistil with 

 long stigmatic lobes. Fruit ripening in the following winter in open racemes, 

 subglubose, dark red, about Yz in. long, with thin acidulous flesh and hard light 

 brown pit-like nutlet. 



A handsome tree and one of the most abundant of the tropical 

 trees found in Florida. It attains the height of 60 or 70 ft. (2om.) 

 and a trunk diameter of i^ or 2 ft. (o.6om.). The bark of trunk is 

 of a rich brown color, exfoliating in thin papery scales which leave 

 areas of a light grayish brown beneath. This gives the bark a decid- 

 edly mottled appearance and sometimes a little roughness due to the 

 irregular loosening scales. 



HABITAT. Unlike the other representative of this genus in the 

 United States, which is confined to saline marshes and shores, this 

 tree is found in the dense hammocks of the coast region of Florida 

 from Cape Canaveral to the Keys on the east coast and from the 

 vicinity of Cape Romano to Cape Sable on the west. It is also found 

 on the Bahama Islands and throughout the West Indies to northern 

 South America. 



PHYSICAL PROPERTIES. Wood very heavy, hard strong, close- 

 grained, brittle and of a rich brown color with thick sap-wood of gradu- 

 ally lighter color until it is of a brownish white tint near the bark. 

 Specific Gravity, 0.9835 ; Percentage of Ash, 5.03 ; Relative Approxi- 

 mate Fuel Value, 0.9340; Coefficient of Elasticity, 113538; Modulus 

 of Rupture, 918; Resistance to Longitudinal Pressure, 771 ; Resistance 

 to Indentation, 394; Weight of a Cubic Foot in Pounds, 61.29. 



USES. Like the wood of the Sea Grape, which is not easily dis- 

 tinguishable from this with the naked eye, it is used to a limited extent 

 in the manufacture of furniture and it makes an excellent fuel. 



ORDER ANONACE^: CUSTARD-APPLE FAMILY. 



Leaves deciduous, alternate, entire, petiolate, pinnately-veined, conduplicate 

 in the bud, without stipules. Flowers solitary, perfect and mostly axillary ; sepals 

 three, valvate in the bud; petals six in two series; stamens numerous on an 

 elevated rounded receptacle with very short filaments and 2-celled introrse 

 anthers adnate to the thick fleshy truncate connective ; pistils few on the summit 

 of the receptacle; ovary I -celled, containing from one to many anatropous ovules. 

 Fruit fleshy, baccate, formed by the ripening of the single or' several united 

 pistils ; seed inclosed in an aril, large anatropous, with thin lustrous brown crus- 

 taceous coat and minute embryo at the base of the ruminate albumen. 



Trees and shrubs of about fifty genera and five hundred and fifty 

 species, with generally aromatic properties and mainly of the tropical 



