Acer 651 
“bowls,” which are used in cotton-dying and washing machines. For this purpose 
it must be cut early in the winter, in order to preserve the purity of its colour, 
and removed as soon as possible, for if left standing till the sap begins to rise, 
which it does early in spring, or left lying exposed to the weather, it is soon 
depreciated in value. Butts of moderate age, free from branches or knots and 
over 18 or 20 inches quarter-girth, are worth from 3s. 6d. to 5s. per foot, or even 
more when near their best market, which is in Lancashire. The measuring of this 
timber presents a difficulty when, as often happens, the logs are not round or quite 
straight, as in conversion they have to be turned down to a true cylinder, and in 
trees grown in the open, as is usually the case, large buttresses and swellings 
often occur, for which allowance must be made.! 
Smaller and rougher trees are worth much less than large clean ones, and are 
converted into planks and smaller rollers, which are used by manufacturers of 
dairy utensils and mangles, brush-makers, toy-makers, and turners, for bobbins 
and many small articles. From 1s. to 2s. per foot is a fair price for such timber, 
but the price varies much, according to the locality. A certain quantity of 
sycamore is cut into veneers, and when the wood has a wavy grain, like that of 
the so-called fiddle-backed maple, it is very ornamental, and may be used with 
good effect for the interiors of cabins, railway carriages, and furniture. What is 
known in the furniture trade as “hare wood” is, I believe, nothing more than fine 
wavy sycamore, which by age or staining has taken a pinkish-brown colour. 
(H. J. E.) 
ACER CAMPESTRE, Common Marte 
Acer campestre, Linneeus, Sp. Pl 1055 (1753); Loudon, Ard. et Frut. Brit. i. 428 (1838); 
Willkomm, Forstliche Flora, 764 (1887); Mathieu, lore Forestidre, 42 (1897). 
A tree, rarely attaining 70 feet in height, usually smaller. Bark, corky on young 
trees, ultimately becoming fissured and scaly. Young branchlets usually pubescent, 
in some forms glabrous, and not remaining green throughout the first year. Leaves 
variable in size, averaging 24 inches long and 3 inches broad, cordate at the 
base, five-lobed, the two basal lobes occasionally obsolete ; lobes shortly acuminate ; 
margin plainly ciliate, usually with a few coarse obtuse teeth; upper surface dark- 
green, pubescent on the nerves; lower surface light-green, with scattered pubes- 
cence, dense on the nerves and tufted on the axils. Petiole with milky sap. 
Plate 207, Figs. 24 and 25, taken from adult trees growing in England, show con- 
siderable variation in the shape of the leaves and the amount of pubescence on the 
branchlets. Fig. 23 represents the foliage of a coppice shoot in a French forest. 
Flowers, in corymbs, at first erect, afterwards pendent, opening with or soon 
after the leaves, green in colour, with pubescent pedicels and sepals; lateral flowers 
1 William Low, Esq., of Monifieth, Scotland, informs me that in his neighbourhood there is a large consumption of 
sycamore for making rollers used in the jute and flax-spinning industry. These are from 7 to 9 inches in diameter, and iZ 
inch thick. They cost about 30s. per gross, and are preferred when made of hard and slowly grown Scotch timber, which is 
considered to be less liable to crack in drying, when cut in transverse sections. 
III 2D 
