20 BULLETIN $£l, U. S. DEPAETMENT OP AGEICULTTJEE. 



our firs is confined to eastern United States, four to the Pacific slope, 

 and one to our Rocky Mountain region. 



The fir trees were represented in geologic times. 1 Many fossil 

 species, not now represented by living forms, are widely distributed 

 from the Upper Eocene to the present. Eemains also of an Abieslike 

 group of trees (Abietites Hisinger) are very common in the Lower 

 and Upper Cretaceous periods. 



BALSAM FIR. 



Abies balsamea (Linn.) Miller. 



COMMON NAME AND EABLY HISTORY. 



The balsam fir does not occur in our Rocky Mountain region, but 

 is found within the Canadian Rocky Mountain region, and for pur- 

 poses of completeness is included here without reference to political 

 boundary. Balsam fir extends southward into the United States 

 only from the Great Lakes and north Atlantic regions (Map No. 5). 

 It is locally known in this wide range by a dozen or more common 

 names, the most appropriate of which is "balsam fir," coined from 

 the tree's technical name. 



The first published reference to balsam fir appeared in 1664 and 

 was by Pierre Boucher, 2 who observed it in eastern Canada. The 

 earliest mention of this fir in New England is by John Josselyn, 3 

 who recorded its characteristics ("bark is smooth, with knobs or 

 blisters in which lyeth clear liquid turpentine") in 1673. Balsam 

 fir has the distinction of being the first of North American firs to 

 become known to science, the earliest technical name applied to it 

 being " Pinus balsamea Linneus," published in 1753, and on which 

 the present name of this fir, Abies balsamea, is based. The tree was, 

 however, cultivated in English gardens as early as 1704, when John 

 Ray, an English writer, published a brief description 4 in Latin of its 

 botanical characters, but without, as was customary then, giving a 

 technical name to it. The early settlers of eastern Canada and north- 

 eastern United States were evidently well acquainted with the balsam 

 fir, for French and English settlers and explorers of those regions 

 described the tree and its resinous product in works published long 

 before it was known to scientific writers. 5 



The botanical history of balsam fir extends over 160 years and in- 

 cludes the application at various dates of 17 different specific and 



1 Fide Dr. Edward W. Berry. See footnote, p. 3. 



2 Hist. Veritable et Nat. de Moeurs et Prod, du Pays de la Nouvelle Prance * * * 

 le Canada, ed. 3, 49, 1664. 



s An account of Two Voyages to New England, 65 (ed. 1), 1673. 



4 "Arboris Balsamum Gileadense fundens," Historian Planatarum, Lib. XXV, Dendr. 

 Secundus, p. 8, Vol. Ill, 1704, by John Eay. 



5 Balsam fir is said to have been grown for ornament in England as early as 1697, and 

 in Norway in about 1772, where it attained a height of from 50 to about 65 feet. 



