AMERICAN FOREST TREES 675 



variety, as they are very ornamental. It is a large tree with branches less 

 upright and crowns more open than in the wild species. The leaves are 

 wide, heart-shaped, and are usually silvery white beneath with minute 

 hairs on the margins, on the veins, and leaf stems. It is not improbable 

 that this variety could be more profitably planted for forestry purposes 

 than the species which grows wild; but there is no present indication 

 that foresters favorably consider either of them. 



LARGETOOTH ASPEN (Populus grandidentata) is named on account 

 of the shape of the leaves. It is sometimes called aspen, popple, white 

 poplar, and large poplar. The wood weighs 28.87 pounds per cubic 

 foot, and is the heaviest of the poplar group except Fremont cottonwood 

 of the arid southwestern regions. The wood is white, attractive, but not 

 strong. It was formerly manufactured into chip hats and shoe heels in 

 New England, and is now used for baskets, crates, boxes, buckets, re- 

 frigerators, excelsior, and pulp. Northern factories usually give it the 

 general name "poplar," and for that reason its importance in the lumber 

 trade is underestimated. Trees may reach a height of seventy feet with 

 a diameter of two; but a height of forty or fifty is more usual. The 

 species' range extends from Nova Scotia to Minnesota, southward to 

 Delaware and Illinois, and along the Appalachian mountains to North 

 Carolina and Tennessee. 



GUMBO LIMBO (Bursera simaruba) is a south Florida species and is 

 known also as West Indian birch. It is in a family by itself with no near 

 relative. It is not a birch. The wood is spongy and very light, weigh- 

 ing less than nineteen pounds per cubic foot. It decays with remarkable 

 rapidity. Branches thrust in the ground take root and grow. An 

 aromatic resin, exuding from wounds in the bark, is manufactured into 

 varnish. The leaves are substituted for tea, and gout remedies are made 

 from the resin. Large trees are fifty feet high and two feet or more in 

 diameter. Another Florida tree, not in the same family as this, is also 

 called gumbo limbo (Simaruba glauca), paradise tree, and bitter 

 wood. Allan thus (Atianthus glandulosa) is in the same family as 

 paradise tree, but is not native in this country, though extensively 

 planted here. 



ANGELICA TREE (Aralia spinosd) . This is a small tree, which usually 

 develops little or no heartwood. The springwood, or the inner and por- 

 ous part of the ring, is broad and yellow, the summerwood, or exterior 

 part of the ring, is narrow and dark. The wood's figure, due to the 

 marked contrast between the outer and inner portions of the rings, is 

 strong. When finished it shows a rich yellow, but somewhat lighter than 

 dwarf sumach which it resembles. It is made into small shop articles, 

 like button boxes, photograph frames, pen racks, stools, and arms for 



