196 PICEA, OR 



a reddish-green or rusty-brown colour on the upper surface ; 

 very finely and irregularly cut or jagged on the margins, and 

 very like those of Pbyllocladus rhomboidalis, with an angular 

 footstalk ; the more younger leaves being of a glossy green, 

 slightly glaucous on the under side ; whUe the adult ones are 

 remarkable for their very white-glaucous, or almost bluish-gray 

 colour. 



It is a distinct variety, and, like the species, tender. 



Gen. PICEA. Bon. The Silver Firs. 



Flowers, monoecious, or male and female on the same plant, 

 but separate ; the male catkins axillary or terminal ; the female 

 ones solitary, on very short branchlets, and cylindrical. 



Cones, erect, cylindrical, or nearly so, axillary, and growing 

 on the upper side of the branches. 



Scales, deciduous, or falling off when ripe from the axile of 

 the cone, which remains persistent on the branches. 



Bracteas, dorsal, and either enclosed by or projecting beyond 

 the scales. 



Seeds, somewhat triangular, full of turpentine, two under 

 each scale, covered with a soft tegument, and furnished with 

 ample persistent, membranaceous wings, more or less wedge- 

 shaped. 



Seed-leaves, in fives. 



Leaves, solitary, fiat, pectinated more or less in two rows, 

 persistent, and silvery below. . 



Name derived from " pix," pitch, — the trees producing abun- 

 dance of resin. 



All trees, found in Europe, Asia, North America, Mexico, and 

 Northern Africa. 



Pliny and the ancient writers originally called the Siver Fir 

 " Abies " (which name may have been a corruption of Alhus, 

 the leaves of the Silver Fir being white when seen from below), 



