CAPRIFOLIACE^: 807 



2. Sambucus glauca, Nutt. 



Leaves o'-T long, with stout grooved petioles much enlarged and naked or some- 

 times furnished at the base with leaf-like appendages, and 5-9 ovate or narrowly 

 oblong leaflets contracted at the apex into long narrow points, unequally wedge- 

 shaped or rounded at the base, and coarsely serrate, with spreading or slightly 



incurved callous-tipped teeth, the lower leaflets often 3-parted or pinnate and the 

 terminal one sometimes furnished with 1 or 2 lateral stalked leaflets, when they 

 unfold yellow-green on the upper, pale on the lower surface, and covered with scat- 

 tered pale hairs, and at maturity glabrous, thin, rather firm in texture, bright green 

 above and pale below, 2'-6' long and ^'-1^' wide, with narrow pale midribs, incon- 

 spicuous veins, and slender petiolules \'~% long on the lateral leaflets and sometimes 

 l^'-2' long on the terminal leaflet; stipels oblong-lanceolate, rounded or acute at the 

 apex, entire, ^'-\' long, caducous, often 0. Flowers \' in diameter, appearing from 

 April in southern California to July in British Columbia, in flat long-branched 

 glabrous cymes 4'-6' wide, with linear acute green caducous bracts and bractlets, 

 the lower branches often from the axils of upper leaves ; flower-buds globose, cov- 

 ered with a glaucous bloom, sometimes turning red before opening; calyx ovoid, 

 and red-brown, with acute scarious lobes; corolla rotate, yellowish white, with oblong 

 divisions rounded at the apex, as long as the stamens. Fruit subglobose, \' in 

 diameter, blue-black, whitened with a thick mealy bloom; flesh rather sweet and 

 juicy. 



A tree,. 30-50 high, with a tall straight trunk sometimes enlarged at the base 

 and 12'-18' in diameter, stout spreading branches forming a compact round-topped 

 head, and branchlets usually without terminal buds, green tinged with red or brown 

 when they first appear, and covered with short white caducous hairs, stout, slightly 

 angled, covered with lustrous red-brown bark in their first winter and nearly encircled 

 by the large triangular leaf-scars marked by conspicuous fibre-vascular bundle- 

 scars; often a broad shrub, with numerous spreading stems. Winter-buds axillary, 

 generally in pairs, superposed or in clusters of 4 or 5, only the upper bud or some- 

 times the lower usually developing, covered with 2 or 3 pairs of opposite broadly 

 ovate chestnut-brown scales, those of the inner rank accrescent, and at maturity acute, 

 entire, green, 1' long, and sometimes developing into pinnate leaves 2'-3' in length. 



