TREES OF AMERICA. 243 



" We come now to the cedars : these, you 

 remember, have leaves covered with exceed- 

 ingly small scales, instead of being smooth 

 and shining like the leaves of the pines and 

 spruces ; and besides, they branch out in dif- 

 ferent directions, instead of being single, and 

 growing regularly upon the branches as the 

 others do. There are only four kinds of cedar 

 in the United States, and one of those is by 

 some .botanists considered a cypress, from the 

 shape of its cone. Perhaps I had better tell 

 you about the cypress before we talk of the 

 cedars, and then you will be able to understand 

 the description better. 



" The cypress is a southern tree ; it is 

 never seen farther north than Delaware, and 

 from thence down to the southern extremity 

 of the country it is constantly found in the 

 swamps. In the Floridas and Louisiana it is 

 a magnificent tree, often more than a hundred 

 and twenty feet high, and from thirty to forty 

 feet in circumference at the base ; but this is 

 not to be taken as the actual size of the trunk, 

 for the cypress, like the large tupelo, has the 

 strange peculiarity of swelling out to a mon- 

 strous size just above the ground, and the 



