470 OUR WOODLAND TREES. 
manufacture of that decay-resisting material— 
Russian leather. 
The qualities of slenderness are conspicuous in 
the stem and branches of this Tree, and the most 
striking characteristic of the bark is its silvery 
hue, contrasted with its markings of brown and 
yellow, and the purplish hue of its twigs. 
Come we now to its flowers and foliage. 
The flowers are in colour whitish, and are 
borne on cylindrical pendulous catkins, which 
appear as early oftentimes as February or March 
—male and female on the same Tree, the former 
of a light brown hue and loosely pendulous, the 
latter green, tinged with the crimson of their 
stigmas—the resulting seed, after fertilization, 
being in the form of minute winged nuts. Touched 
by the hand when ripe, the mass of seeds becomes 
disintegrated, each germ, however, being en- 
dowed with the power of flight. The small, 
acutely-pointed leaves—as poised on_ their 
delicate stalks, they lightly hang on the slender 
twigs which support them—are the embodiment 
of gracefulness, Their form is four-sided, appear- 
ing at a distance to be triangular ; but what would 
