44 LAURACEAE 



dark gray bark; greenish soft wood with a zone of moderate 

 ducts in the spring growth and decreasingly smaller ones 

 diffused through the remainder, and distinct medullary rays; 

 rather slender terete twigs; rounded continuous pale pith with 

 firmer diaphragms, becoming brownish and spongy or cham- 

 bered; alternate half-round or broadly crescent-shaped leaf- 

 scars with about 5 bundle-traces in a single series; no stipule- 

 scars with about 5 bundle-traces in a single series; no stipule- 

 naked and elongated, the lateral often superposed with the 

 upper globose and early losing its few outer scales and becom- 

 ing brown-silky ; simple large short-stalked leaves; perfect 

 lurid large mostly solitary polypetalous flowers; and large 

 oblong fleshy fruit with several large brown seeds. 

 Leaves oblanceolate or obovate, acuminate. A. triloba. 



Family LAURACEAE. Laurel Family. 

 A family of moderate size, chiefly tropical, including 

 the classic laurel or bay tree, and furnishing cinnamon, cam- 

 phor, the alligator pear, etc.: little used in out-of-door planting. 



BENZOIN. Spice Bush. 



Deciduous aromatic shrubs with pale wood with minute 

 diffused ducts and fine medullary ray&; slender terete twigs 

 with rounded homogeneous pith; alternate rather appressed 

 superposed ovoid buds with about 3 exposed scales, the upper- 

 most one or two early developing into small clusters of rounded 

 flower-buds; no end bud; rather elliptical moderate entire 

 leaves; low crescent-shaped leaf scars with 3 bundle-traces; 

 no stipule-scars; small yellow polygamous apetalous flowers in 

 nearly sessile lateral clusters; and red spicy drupes. 

 Glabrate. B. aestivale. 



Pubescent. B. melissaefolium. 



SASSAFRAS. 



Deciduous finally large aromatic trees with rather soft 

 brown ring-porous wood with the small autumnal ducts in 

 more or less evident tangential series; rather slender green 



