XII. 1. THE SASSAFRAS TREE. 320 
feet high, and two feet in diameter, and in the Southern and 
Western States, is said to attain a still loftier stature. ‘“ From 
Boston to the banks of the Mississippi, and from the shores of 
the ocean in Virginia to the remotest wilds of Upper Louisiana 
beyond the Missouri, comprising an extent in each direction of 
more than one thousand eight hundred miles, the sassafras is 
sufficiently multiplied to be ranked among the most common 
trees.”’—Michaur, II, 145. 
It is found in almost every part of Massachusetts, and seems 
to flourish in almost every kind of soil. In the vicinity of Bos- 
ton, in soil resting upon crumbled grauwacke, it attains larger 
dimensions of diameter and height, than I have elsewhere ob- 
served it. It is nowhere found very abundantly, but is usually 
allowed to remain, out of regard for its medicinal properties, 
and the beauty of its foliage and fruit, about fences, and on 
the borders of fields, where it is most frequently seen. This 
tree has the credit of having aided in the discovery of America, 
as it is said to have been its strong fragrance, smelt by Colum- 
bus, which encouraged him to persevere, and enabled him to 
convince his mutinous crew that land was near. 
The sassafras never grows to the size of a tree of the first 
class. One was growing in 1842, in West Cambridge, which 
measured more than three feet through at the base, and rose, 
without a limb, more than thirty feet, with a trunk very straight 
and slightly diminished, above which it had a somewhat lofty 
and broad head. It was nearly sixty feet high, and had been 
long growing by itself. It was felled and its roots dug up, zo 
allow a stone wall to run in a right line. Such pieces of barbar- 
ism are still but too common. A tree so beautiful and lofty, 
and of such rare dimensions, such an ornament to a bare hill- 
side, sacrificed to the straightness of a wall! 
The sassafras has been much cultivated in England as an 
ornamental tree. It is usually propagated by seeds imported 
from this country. These, as soon as received, are sown or put 
in a rot-heap, as they sometimes remain two or three years in 
the ground before they comeup. It may be also propagated by 
suckers which spring up in great numbers from the long creep- 
ing roots of old trees. 
Several other species of sassafras are found in this country. 
