CLASS I. — GYMN(^8PEHMS. 



Plants destitute of a closed ovary, style or stigma ; ovules 

 generally borne naked on a carpellary scale, which forms part 

 of a cone. Cotyledons often several (Fig. 6). 



CONIFERS, PINE FAMILY. 



Trees or shrubs with wood of peculiar structure (Tigs. 50, 51) 

 destitiite of ducts, with resinous and aromatic juice, leaves 

 generally evergreen and needle-shaped or awl-shaped, and 

 flowers destitute of floral envelopes, monoecious or dioecious, 

 the staminate ones commonly in catkins, the pistillate ones 

 in cones. 



I. PINUS, PINE. 



Sterile flowers spirally arranged in inconspicuous catkins, 

 borne at the base of the young shoot of the season, each 

 flower consisting of a single, nearly sessile anther (Fig. 209, 2). 

 Fertile flowers in catkins which consist of spirally arranged 

 carpel-scales, each scale springing from the axil of a bract 

 and bearing at its own base two ovules (Fig. 209, 3). Fruit a 

 cone, formed of the thickened carpellary scales, ripening the 

 second autumn after the flower opened. Primary leaves, thin 

 and chaffy bud-scales, from the axils of which spring the 

 bundles of 2-5 nearly persistent, needle-like, evergreen 

 leaves, from 1-15 in. long (Fig. 209, d). 



a. (P. STEOBUS), White Pine. A tall tree, 75-160 ft. high, much 

 branched and spreading when growing in open ground, but often 

 with few or no living branches below the height of 100 ft. when 

 growing in dense forests. Leaves clustered in fives, slender, 3-4 in. 

 long, smooth, and pale or with a whitish bloom. Cones 5-6 in. long, 

 not stout. The wood is soft, durable, does not readily warp, and is 

 therefore very valuable for lumber. 



