LUTHER BURBANK 
There are some members of the laurel family, 
also, that produce commercial products that make 
them perhaps worthy of attention. The camphor 
tree is too tender to be grown in our latitudes, but 
its relative, the sassafras, is a common tree 
throughout the eastern states, thriving even in 
New York and New England. Its bark furnishes 
the characteristic flavoring that is used for per- 
fuming soaps and for similar purposes. The pro- 
duction of the sassafras would not constitute a 
significant industry under any circumstances, 
doubtless, yet there would be a measure of scien- 
tific interest in testing its capacities for improve- 
ment, and not unlikely new uses would be found 
for its product if it were made available in larger 
quantity. 
Another tribe that furnishes a product of a 
unique quality is that represented by a familiar 
wild shrub known in the eastern states as the wax 
berry or candle berry (Myrica cerifera) and some- 
times also spoken of as the bay berry owing to the 
fragrance of its leaves. 
This shrub bears an abundance of small berries 
from which may be extracted a quantity of hard 
greenish fragrant wax, which was formerly much 
prized for the making of candles, and which has a 
certain value for the various other uses to which 
wax is put. 
[266] 
