TIIE DOGWOODS 111 



and boat-building. Wood pulp consumes much of the 

 yeai'ly harvest. It is knowni as "poplar,'* whose wood it 

 resembles. Ordinary postal cards are made of it. The 

 bark yields a drug used as a heart stimulant. 



THE DOGVv^OODS 



Foliage of exceptional beauty is the distinguishing trait 

 of the trees in the cornel famil}^ from the standpoint of the 

 landscape gardener and the lover of the woods. Showy 

 flowers and fruit belong to some of the species; extremely 

 hard, close-textured wood belongs to all; and this means 

 slow growth, which is a limitation in the eyes of the planter 

 who wishes quick results. But he who plants a cornel tree 

 and watches it season after season, finds it one of the most 

 interesting of nature studies through the whole round of 

 the year. 



The dogwoods are slender-twigged trees of small size, 

 with simple, entire leaves, strongly ribbed, and with one 

 exception, set opposite upon the twigs. Fifty species are 

 distributed over the Northern Hemisphere; one crosses the 

 equator into Peru. Four of the seventeen species found in 

 the United States are trees; the rest are shrubs, one of them 

 the low-growing bunchberry of our Northern woods. 



The Flowering Dogwood 



Cornus jlorida, Linn. 



The flowering dogwood {see illustration, pageloJf)is a little 

 tree whose round, bushy, flat-topped head is made of short, 

 horizontal branches. The twigs hold erect in the winter 



