836 



TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



axils of ovate acuminate rusty-pubescent bracts, in pubescent panicles J'-f ' in length; calyx 

 campanulate, scarious; stamens 1 or#, filaments longer than the calyx, anthers declinate, 

 nearly ' long; ovary broad-ovate, rounded at apex, longer than the calyx, the short style 

 terminating in large reflexed stigmatic lobes. Fruit narrow-spathulate to oblong-obovate, 

 \'-\ ' long and about \' wide, the thin wing decurrent on the short terete body, rounded 

 and emarginate at apex and tipped with the elongated persistent conspicuous style. 



A tree, rarely 20-25 high, with a trunk 8-10 long and occasionally 8' in diameter, and 

 slender terete branchlets dark green and puberulous when they first appear, soon becoming 

 ashy gray and roughened by numerous minute pale elevated lenticels, gradually turning 

 dark gray, or brown in their second and third years; more otten a shrub, with numerous 

 slender erect stems 4-12 tall. Winter-buds: terminal, about \' long, obtuse, with thick 

 ovate light brown pubescent scales rounded on the back. Bark of the trunk thin, gray or 

 light brown tinged with red, separating on the surface into large papery scales. Wood 

 heavy, hard, close-grained, brown, with thick lighter-colored sapwood. 



Distribution. Western Texas, along rocky beds of streams and deep ravines, Valverde 

 County (near Devil's River, Del Rio and Comstock); on the mountains of northeastern 

 Mexico; apparently most common and of its largest size on the Sierra Nevada of Nuevo 

 Leon. 



3. Fraxinus Lowellii Sarg. 



Leaves 3|'-6' long, with a stout glabrous or slightly villose petiole, and 5 or rarely 3 ovate 

 stalked leaflets, acuminate and long-pointed, acute or rarely rounded at apex, cuneate at 

 base, serrate, often only above the middle, with small remote teeth, yellow-green, glabrous, 



Fig. 740 



or puberulous along the midrib above, glabrous or rarely sparingly viilose near the base of 

 the slender pale midrib below, 2|'-3' long and \'-\\' wide, with thin primary veins arching 

 and united near the slightly thickened and revolute margins; on vigorous shoots occasion- 

 ally 1-foliolate with a broad-ovate or semi-orbicular leaflet. Flowers unknown. Fruit 

 ripening in July, in long glabrous panicles, oblong-obovate to oblong-elliptic, surrounded 

 at base by the minute slightly dentate calyx, l'-lf long, \'-\' wide, the wing broad or 

 gradually narrowed and rounded, and often emarginate at apex and extending to the base 

 of the thin compressed many-rayed body about three-quarters the length of the fruit. 



TA. tree, 20-25 high, with dark deeply furrowed bark, stout quadrangular otten winged 

 branchlets orange-brown in their first season and dark gray-brown the following year. 



