101S ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 



which are very numerous, and which, in their season, robe the tree in white, 

 like a full-blown apple tree, and render it one of the fairest ornaments of the 

 American forests." Catesby, who first described this tree, says that the 

 blossoms break forth in the beginning of March, being at first not so wide as 

 a sixpence, but increasing gradually to the breadth of a man's hand; being not 

 of their full bigness till about six weeks after they begin to open. The 

 fruits, which are of a vivid glossy red, and of an oval shape, are always united : 

 they remain upon the trees till the first frosts; when, notwithstanding their 

 bitterness, they are devoured by the red-breasted thrush (Turdus migratorius 

 L.), which, about this period, arrives from the northern regions, and the 

 mocking-bird (T. poh'glottus, L.), during the whole winter. In England, this 

 tree does not thrive nearly so well as in its native country, seldom being found, 

 in the neighbourhood of London, higher than 7 ft. or 8 ft., and not often 

 flowering; though at White Knights it attains a larger size, and flowers freely 

 every year. 



Geography. In America, the Cornus fl6rida is first found on the Columbia 

 river, near its confluence with the sea. In the United States, it appears in 

 Massachusetts, between n. lat. 42° and 43°. " In proceeding southward, it is 

 met with uninterruptedly throughout the eastern and western states, and 

 the two Floridas, to the banks of the Mississippi. Over this vast extent of 

 country it is one of the most common trees ; and it abounds particularly in 

 New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia, wherever the soil is moist, 

 gravelly, and somewhat uneven : farther south, in the Carolinas, Georgia, and 

 the Floridas, it is found only on the borders of swamps, and never in the pine 

 barrens, where the soil is too dry and sandy to sustain its vegetation. In the 

 most fertile districts of Kentucky and West Tennessee, it does not appear in 

 the forest, except where the soil is gravelly, and of a middling quality. (Michx.) 

 Mr. William Bartram, in his Travels in Georgia and Florida, gives the following 

 account of the appearance of this tree near the banks of the Alabama river: — 

 " We now entered a remarkable grove of dogwood trees (Cornus florida), 

 which continued nine or ten miles unaltered, except here and there by a 

 towering Magnolia grandiflora. The land on which they stand is an exact 

 level ; the surface a shallow, loose, black mould, on a stratum of stiff yellowish 

 clay. These trees were about, 12 ft. high, spreading horizontally ; and their 

 limbs meeting, and interlocking with each other, formed one vast, shady, cool 

 grove, so dense and humid as to exclude the sunbeams, and prevent the 

 intrusion of almost every other vegetable ; affording us a most desirable shelter 

 from the fervid sunbeams at noonday. This admirable grove, by way of 

 eminence, has acquired the name of the Dog Woods. During a progress of 

 nearly seventy miles through this high forest, there was constantly presented to 

 view, on one hand or the other, spacious groves of this fine flowering tree, 

 which must, in the spring season, when covered with blossoms, exhibit a most 

 pleasing scene; when, at the same time, a variety of other sweet shrubs display 

 their beauty, adorned in their gay apparel ; as the Halesia, Stewarts, 

 //'J'sculus, Pavia, Azalea, &c, entangled with garlands of Tecoma crucigera, 

 T. radicans, Gelscmium sempervirens, Wistaria frutescens, <7aprifolium semper- 

 \ irons, &c. ; and, at the same time, the superb Magnolia grandiflora, standing in 

 front of the dark groves, towering far above the common level." (Bartram's 

 Travels, p. 400.) 



History. This fine tree was first discovered in Virginia, by Banister; and 

 after* aids, by Catesby, in the forests of Carolina. It was cultivated in Britain 

 by Fairchild, before 1731 ; and by Miller, in 1739; and has since been propa- 

 gated, and introduced into our principal collections. As already observed, 

 however, it does not thrive in the neighbourhood of London. The only in- 

 stances, of which we have heard, of its flowering near the metropolis are, at 

 South Lodge, on Enfield ("base, where Collinson informs us he went to see it 

 when it flowered for the first time; at Syon Hill; and at Syon House. Miller, 

 in 1752, says that the tree is common in English gardens, under the name 

 of Virginian dogwood, that it is as hardy as any of the other species ; and that, 

 though if produces abundance of large leaves, it is not plentiful of flowers 



