THE WHITE BIECH. 



On the sandy plains of many parts of New England, 

 some of the most prominent objects are coppices of 

 slender White Birch trees, intermingled with pitch-piae. 

 These trees are seldom more than four or five inches in 

 diameter, risiag to the height of about twenty feet, with 

 a grayish-white trunk, and, as may be observed in win- 

 ter, a dense and dark-colored spray. This species is 

 called Poplar Birch, from the tremulous habit of the 

 foliage, but is never assembled in large forest groups. 

 Like the alder, it is employed by Nature for the shading 

 of her living pictures, and for producing those gradations 

 which are the charm of spontaneous wood-scenery. In 

 all the Northern States, a pitch-pine wood is generally 

 fringed with White Birches, and outside of them is a stiU 

 more humble growth of hazels, cornels, and vacciniums, 

 uniting them imperceptibly with the herbage of the plain. 



The White Birch is remarkable for its elegance. It 

 seldom divides the main stem, which extends to the sunmiit 

 of the tree, giving out from aU parts numerous slender 

 branches, forming a very neat and beautiful spray, of a 

 dark chocolate-color, contrasting finely with the white- 

 ness of the trunk. This tree, when growing as a standard, 

 has more of a pyramidal shape than in a wood ; but it 

 does not attain in this country the magnitude of the 

 same species in Europe. The durability of the bark of 

 the White Birch is said to be unsurpassed by that of any 

 other vegetable substance. Selby records a fact related 

 by Du Hamel, which is remarkable. In the ruins of 



