THE PINE FAMILY. 5 



coast and extends from South Carolina and Florida to Louisiana. Its 

 leaves, often ten or twelve inches long-, are slightly tile-like along their mar- 

 gins and have a raised ridge on their undersides. They grow in bunches of 

 two or three. The cones also are very large and attractive looking, espe- 

 cially when they widely and irregularly open their scales. These are long 

 and narrow and project at their apices a recurved point. Also at their tips 

 they are a rich brown and so glossy as to give the appearance of having 

 been varnished. Elliott's pine is said to inhabit the Bahamas, several of 

 the islands of the West Indies and the mountains of Central America. 



P, serd/ina, pond pine, an inhabitant of swamps near the coast, and 

 which occurs from Florida to North Carolina, bears leaves which resemble 

 somewhat those of Pinus heterophylla. They are, however, not so long 

 and of a more yellow tone of green. Perhaps in general appearances the 

 tree most closely suggests Pinus rigida, that is, if one puts aside the fact 

 that the branches of the latter are very crowded. The cones of Pinus 

 serotina, which grow in clusters about the branches, are seldom over two 

 and a half inches long. In their early days they are pyramidal in outline, 

 but at maturity when their long narrow scales have opened widely they are 

 almost as broad as they are long, and have then quite a squatty look. They 

 are not, however, devoid of charm for they are covered with a silvery sheen. 

 Their prickles are short and fragile. 



LONQ=LEAVED PINE, SOUTHERN YELLOW PINE, 

 GEORGIA PINE. 



PiuKS palustris. 



Bark: orange-brown, separating into thin scaly plates. Leaves: ten to fifteen 

 inches long; dark bluish green ; growing closely in bunches of three, and forming 

 tliick tufts at the ends of the branches ; sheaths from one to one and a quarter 

 inches long; slender; flexible. Cones: six to ten inches long; light brown ; 

 cylindrical. Scales : thick, with small, blunt spines at their ends, and at maturity 

 spreading at right angles to the axis. 



This remarkable tree of the lower district is well known throughout its 

 localit\^ Indeed, its beauty when young, and the horizontal spread of its 

 great branches, would make it a notable figure in any landscape. Its very 

 long leaves also, tufted as they are at the ends of the branches, produce a 

 soft plume-like and startling effect when stirred by a strong breeze. Every 

 year an abundance of these leaves is shed by the tree and from their fibre a 

 certain sort of matting is made as well as a material for bags which are 

 used to cover cotton bales. In fact, the fibre of these pine needles is in 



