Naked wood 



68 1 



the blue flowers open from March to May. The fruit is black, somewhat 3-lobed, 

 about 7 mm. thick. 



3. ISLAND CEANOTHUS Ceanothus arboreus Greene 



This small tree or shrub is confined, so far as known, to the islands near the 

 coast of southern Cahfomia. 

 It becomes as much as 8 me- 

 ters high, with a trunk 2.5 

 dm. in diameter, and is also 

 known as Tree myrtle. 



The young twigs are angu- 

 lar, densely white- velvety, be- 

 coming smooth, round and 

 brown. The leaves are ovate 

 to elHptic, blunt or pointed, 

 finely toothed, thick, strongly 

 3-veined from the obtuse base, 

 5 to 10 cm. long, dark green 

 and finely velvety on the up- 

 per side, densely white- velvety 

 on the under surface; the 

 stout leaf-stalks are 5 to 20 

 mm. long. The hght blue 

 flowers are in rather dense white-velvety clusters at the ends of twigs and open 

 from January to April. The fruit is black, 7 to 8 mm. thick. 



The wood, which has a specific gravity of about 0.78, is hard, dense and 

 reddish brown. The species has been confused with the widely distributed 

 Ceanothus velutinus, which it resembles. 



Fig. 633. Island Ceanothus. 



VII. NAKEDWOOD 



GENUS COLUBRINA L. C. RICHARD 

 Species Colubrina reclinata (L'Heritier) Brongniart 

 Ceanothus redinatus L'Heritier 



HE genus Colubrina (Latin, from coluber, a serpent), named by Lin- 

 naeus, with reference to the snake-hke ridges on the trunks of some 

 species, includes about 15 species of shrubs and trees, most of them 

 natives of tropical and subtropical America, one Asiatic. Of the 

 West Indian species, two occur in southern Florida, one a tree, as described below, 

 the other, Colubrina Cohihrina (Linnaeus) Millspaugh, the type of the genus, a 

 shrub; and there are two Texan shrubby species. They all have alternate, stalked 



