MAPLE FAMILY 
side by side, one may have iarge, thin, five-lobed leaves, and 
the other small, thick, three-lobed leaves, or both forms may 
be found on different parts of the same 
tree, and sometimes even on the same 
branch. 
The flowers appear very early, only 
chose of the silver maple precede them. 
Perfect flowers occasionally occur, but 
generally the staminate and_ pistillate 
flowers are produced on separate trees, 
although a branch with staminate flow- 
ers can be found on a tree on which the 
flowers are pistillate, and individual pistil- 
late clusters on a staminate branch. If 
the tree is very red, one may be certain 
Key of Red Maple, «deer that the flowers are pistillate, but if yel- 
ee lowish they are staminate. 
All the maples show what is called the curled and bird’s-eye 
varieties. These are an accidental and fortuitous arrange- 
ment of the woody fibre, and as there is no marked outward 
indication of these varieties, only experienced woodsmen can 
detect them in the living tree, which they do from some slight 
peculiarities of the bark. It is said that these forms are 
found only in old trees. Such lumber is now very valuable 
for the interior furnishings of rooms, railway-cars, and steam- 
ship saloons. How many such trees were destroyed in the early 
days through ignorance or indifference no one knows, _ I re- 
call a country home where the kitchen-stove was fed one 
entire winter with the most beautiful curled and bird’s-eye ma- 
ple, carefully cut into cordwood eighteen inches in length. 
Of course the owner knew nothing of the existence of these 
trees until they confronted him in his woodpile, and his anger 
and dismay may be imagined as he bewailed the stupidity of 
his workmen. 
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