146 FAMILIAR TREES 
rectangular scales is very characteristic, and is, per- 
haps, a main reason for the impunity with which 
the Plane thrives in the soot-laden atmosphere of 
our metropolis. A copious annual crop of smoothly- 
polished leaves, readily washed by the slightest 
shower, and thus presenting a large surface to the 
food-giving light and air, and a bark which thus 
yearly throws off all impurity, constitute an ideal 
city tree. 
We can hardly, perhaps, expect the enthusi- 
asm of the poet to be quickly roused by the 
foreign charm of exotic trees, so that it is 
naturally the poets of America, the native home 
ot one variety of the Plane, who sing its praises. 
It is to the appearance produced by this shedding 
of the bark that Bryant alludes when he writes of 
the Green River: 
“Clear are the depths where its eddies play, 
And dimples deepen and whirl away; 
And the Plane-tree’s speckled arms o’ershoot 
The swifter current that mines its root.” 
The leaves are large, with stalks of some length, 
and prominent veins, generally five in number, radiat- 
ing to the acute points of their gracefully-lobed 
outline. They are, however, “ pseudo-palmate,” only 
three veins radiating from the base, and the other 
principal ones being branches of these, unlike the 
Sycamore, in which five or more radiate from the 
base. Individual leaves may be as much as nine 
inches long and eight in breadth, and though a 
certain general character of outline distinguishes 
the different geographical “ races,” the variety of 
