R UE FAMILY 



Corolla. — Petals four or five, white, downy, spreading, hypogy 

 nous, imbricate in tlie bud. 



Stamens. — Five, alternate with the petals, hypogynous, the pistil- 

 late flowers svith rudimentary anthers ; filaments awl-shaped, more 

 or less hairy; anthers ovate or cordate, two-celled, cells opening 

 longitudinally. 



Pistils. — Ovary superior, hairy, aboi tive in the staniinate flowers, 

 two to three-celled ; style short ; stigma two to three-lobed ; ovules 

 two in each cell. 



Fruit. — Samara, orbicular, surrounded by a broad, many-veined 

 reticulate membranous ring, two-seeded. Ripens in October and 

 hangs in clusters until midwinter. 



The Wafer Ash is a tree iu niitiiattire ; no matter if only 

 six feet high, it will assume the arborescent habit and pro- 

 duce a broad, rounded, spreading head, as much as to say 

 " I can be a tree if I am small." Long ago, like the Papaw, 

 it acknowledged itself vanquished in the struggle for light 

 and elected to grow in the shade. Its northern limit is the 

 north shore of Lake Ontario, its southern the mountains of 

 Mexico, and in all that vast region it forms no inconsiderable 

 part of the undergrowth of the forest. 



Losing on many sides in the struggle for existence it has 

 certainly gained on one, for it has developed one of the best 

 adaptations for disseminating seed found in the vegetable 

 world. A seed like that of the Magnolia has little chance 

 of getting far from home, unless it can borrow wings by 

 making itself attractive to birds, or legs by being sought by 

 animals. And if all the seeds of a tree should germinate 

 under the parent shade there would be little chance for any 

 seedling. Hence a tree has made a long step forward in 

 the struggle for existence when it is able to equip its seeds 

 with wings of their own which will bear them by the aid of 

 a favoring breeze away from the parent tree. 



It is just this that the Wafer Ash has accomplished. Its 

 fruit is a two-seeded samara, that is, a closed wooden box in 

 which are safely stored two seeds. If that were all, al- 

 though the cover might be tight and the seeds secure from 

 harm, they could never get very far from home. At this 

 point the life-saving appliance comes in. Upon each of the 



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