584 



TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



.small square plates. Wood heavy, hard, strong, close-grained, light red-brown, with thin 

 lighter colored sapwood of 8-10 layers of annual growth; occasionally used for fuel. 



Distribution. Borders of streams and moist sandy soil in the bottoms of canons, and as a 

 low shrub on dry hillsides and mesas from Solano County and the shores of the Bay of San 

 Francisco southward through the coast ranges of California to the foothills of the San 

 Bernardino Mountains, and the valley of the San Jacinto River; in Lower California 

 southward to the western slopes of the San Pedro Martir Mountains. 



Generally cultivated as an ornamental plant in California ami occasionally in western 

 and southern Europe. 



22. Primus Lyonii Sarg. 

 Primus integrifolia Sarg. 



Leaves ovate to lanceolate, acuminate or abruptly narrowed into a short point at apex, 

 cuneate, truncate or rounded at base, with thickened revolute undulate entire or occasion- 

 ally, especially on vigorous shoots, remotely and minutely spinulose-dentate margins, gla- 



Fig. 535 



brous, coriaceous, dark green and lustrous above, paler below, reticulate-venulose, 2'-3' 

 long and -|'-2f' wide, with a stout midrib and obscure veins; persistent; petioles stout, 

 yellow, $'-' in length. Flowers appearing from March to June, about \' in diameter, on 

 slender pedicels from the axils of acuminate caducous bracts, in crowded many-flowered 

 glabrous racemes 3 '-4' long; calyx-tube cup-shaped, orange-brown, the lobes acute, apicu- 

 late, reflexed after the flowers open, deciduous, about one third as long as the obovate petals 

 rounded and undulate above and narrowed below into a short claw; stamens slightly ex- 

 serted, with incurved filaments and small yellow anthers; ovary raised on a short stipe, the 

 style bent near the apex and terminating in a large orbicular stigma. Fruit ripening late in 

 the autumn, on stout pedicels, in drooping few-fruited racemes, subglobose to short-oblong, 

 dark purple or nearly black at maturity, \'-\\' in diameter, with thick luscious flesh some- 

 times \' thick; stone ovoid to obovoid, slightly compressed, thin-walled, about f ' long, 

 pointed at apex, pale yellow-brown, conspicuously marked by reticulate orange-colored 

 lines, and by 3 dark bands radiating from base to apex along one suture, and by a single 

 narrow line on the other suture. 



A bushy tree, sometimes 25-30 high, with one or several stout erect or spreading stems 

 l-3 in diameter, spreading branches forming a broad compact head, and stout branchlets 

 light yellow-green when they first appear, becoming light and ultimately dark reddish 

 brown, and much roughened by the large elevated leaf-scars. Winter-buds acute or ob- 



