TREES GROWING NEAR WATER. 99 



Its wood is brown and strong. It is, however, not regarded 

 as being of much value commercially, although necessity has 

 sometimes caused it to be used as a substitute for the wood of 

 the white ash. This tree and the red ash, while preferring 

 moist ground, often grow on drier soil. 







" The mountain stirr'd its bushy crown 

 And, as tradition teaches, 

 Young ashes pirouetted down 



Coquetting with young beeches ; 

 And briony-vine and ivy-wreath 



Ran forward to his rhyming, 



And from the valleys underneath 



Came little copses climbing." 



Tennyson. 



BALD CYPRESS. CYPRESS. {Plate XLIV.) 

 Taxbdium distichum. 



FAMILY SHAPE HEIGHT RANGE TIME OF BLOOto 



Pine. Conical; branches^ 60-150 feet. Delaware to Te.vas, April, 



spreading. Arkansas northward. 



Bark: reddish brown ; furrowed. Branchlets: slender. Leaves: light green ; 

 simple; growing closely in two ranks along the branches ; half an inch long; 

 needle-shaped ; pointed ; occurring awl-shaped and overlapping each other ; 

 deciduous. Flowers: monoecious ; yellowish ; appearing some time before the 

 leaves. Staminate Jlozvers : growing compactly in terminal, drooping panicled 

 spikes. Pistillate ones: growing in rounded clusters. Cones : light brown; glob- 

 ular ; the several angular scales forming a closed ball until mature. 



There is a strangeness in the ways and majestic aloofness 

 of the bald cypress. It is not as other trees. In the Atlantic 

 and Gulf states, where it sometimes forms extensive forests, 

 few can enter without feeling a desire to know its history. It 

 is ingenious too. That it may prevent the escape of moisture 

 and resist the violence of autumnal gales, is thought to be the 

 reason that its leaves, which may have been slender and spread 

 out from the branches, sometimes become close and scale-like. 

 At the time of pollenation, when it is shedding its golden 

 dust, and with its leaves in various positions, it is represented 

 by the illustration. 



