134 WAYSIDE AND WOODLAND BLOSSOMS. 



opposite leaves. The leaflets are toothed, and the teeth bear 

 glands on the lower side, \vhence the specific name. Its 

 flowers, which open in August, are borne in clusters at the end 

 of the branches. They are small, greenish-white in colour, and 

 give off an evil odour. There are two forms of flowers, the 

 one consisting of a five-parted calyx, five petals, and ten 

 stamens ; the other with calyx and petals the same, but fewer 

 stamens and three, four, or five ovaries. The flowers are not 

 represented in our illustration, the drawing having been made 

 when the tree was in fruit. These will be seen to look like 

 small imitations of ash-keys. It is a rapid grower in almost any 

 soil, though it succeeds best in a light humid earth, and 

 appreciates a little shelter. Its leaves are the favourite food of 

 one of the large silk-producing moths (Attacus cynthia), but 

 most other insects disapprove of it. 



Maples (Acer). 



Our English Maple is the Common or Small-leaved or 

 Field Maple (Acer campestre) that grows wild in hedge- 

 rows and thickets in England and Wales, but is only 

 naturalized in Scotland. It is a small spreading tree, scarcely 

 exceeding twenty feet in height, with leaves five-lobed, the 

 lobes again lobed or toothed. The flowers are small, green, in 

 corymbs, with narrow sepals and narrower petals, succeeded by 

 two-winged two-seeded fruits called samaras j the wings being 

 horizontal. Flowers May and June. 



The Great Maple or Sycamore (A. pseudo-plat anus] is a tree 

 commonly grown in the streets, squares, and parks of London 

 and other great cities on account of its smoke-enduring 

 qualities. It has been so long established here that it is 

 generally but erroneously regarded as a native. It is a tree 

 of very rapid growth, and attains a height of about eighty 

 feet ; living upwards of two hundred years. Leaves large, 



