410 BETULACE^E. (BIRCH FAMILY.) 



scale-like bract and with a pair of bractlets. Stamens 2-8: filaments some- 

 what united below. Ovary with 3 scales at its base, and 2 thread-like stigmas. 

 Fruit a small globular nut, studded with resinous grains or wax. (MvptKT), the 

 ancient name of the Tamarisk or some other shrub ; perhaps from pvpifa 

 to perfume.) 



1. Iff. Gale, L. (SWEET GALE.) Leaves wedge-lanceolate, serrate towards 

 the apex; pale, later than the flowers; sterile catkins closely clustered; nuts in im- 

 bricated heads, enclosed in the thick pointed ovate scales which coalesce with 

 its base. Wet borders of ponds, New England to Virginia in the mountains, 

 Penn., Wisconsin, and northward. April. Shrub 3 -5 high. (Eu.) 



2. M. cerifera, L. (BAYBEKRY. WAX-MYRTLE.) leaves oblong-lan- 

 ceolate, narrowed at the base, entire or wavy-toothed tOAvards the apex, shining 

 and resinous-dotted both sides, somewhat preceding the flowers ; steiile catkins scattered, 

 oblong ; scales wedge-shaped at the base ; nuts scattered and naked, incrusted 

 with white wax. Sandy soil on and near the sea-shore : also on Lake Erie. 

 May. Shrub 3 - 8 high, with fragrant leaves : the catkins sessile along the 

 last year's branches ; the fruits sometimes persistent for 2 or 3 years. 



2. COMPTONIA, Solander. SWEET FERN. 



Flowers monoecious ; the sterile in cylindrical catkins, with kidney-heart- 

 shaped pointed scale-like bracts, and 3-6 stamens; the fertile in globular 

 aments, bur-like : ovary surrounded by 5 or 6 long linear-awl-shaped scales, 

 persistent around the ovoid-oblong smooth nut: otherwi.se as in Myrica. 

 Leaves linear-lanceolate, pinnatifid with many rounded lobes, thin, appearing 

 rather later than the flowers. Stipules half heart-shaped. (Named after Henry 

 Compton, Bishop of London a century ago, a cultivator and patron of botany.) 



1. C. asplenifolia, Ait. Sterile hills, E. New England to Virginia. 

 Also N. Wisconsin. April, May. Shrub, l-2 high, with sweet-scented 

 fern-like leaves. 



ORDER 109. BETULACE^E. (BIRCH FAMILY.) 



Monoecious trees or shrubs, with both kinds of flowers in scaly catkins, 2 or 

 3 under each bract, and no involucre to the naked 1-cetted and 1-seeded often 

 winged nut, which results from a 2-celled and 2-ovuled ovary ; otherwise 

 much as in the Oak Family. 



1. BETUL.A, Tourn. BIRCH. 



Sterile flowers 3, and bractlets 2, under each scale or bract of the catkins, 

 consisting each of a calyx of one scale and 4 stamens attached to its base : fila- 

 ments very short: anthers 1 -celled. Fertile flowers 3 under each 3-lobed bract, 

 with no separate bractlets and no calyx, each of a naked ovary with 2 thread- 

 like stigmas, becoming a broadly winged and scale-like nutlet or small samara. 

 Seed suspended, anatropous. Cotyledons flattish, oblong. Outer bark usually 

 separable in thin horizontal sheets, that of the branchlets dotted. Twigs and 



