FOREST TREES. 



155 



HALESiA^ Ellis. — Silver-hell Tree. 



A genus of deciduous shrubs, or small trees, with large, veiny 

 and pointed leaves, and showy white, or pinkish flowers, on 

 long, slender stalks in clusters or short racemes, from axillary 

 buds of the preceding year. Fruit large, and dry, with two 

 to four wings, the shell within very hard and horn-like. Seeds 

 cylindical, and oval in each cell. Three species, and all indi- 

 genous to the United States. 



Halesia diptera, L. — Two- winged Silver-bell Tree. — Leaves 

 oval, coarsely serrate, four to five inches long, soft, pubescent. 

 Flovv'ers white, about an inch long, on slender pedicels. Fruit 

 compressed, an inch long, with two wings. A small tree or 

 large shrub, with very hard wood. In rich woods of Georgia 

 and Florida, and westward. Not quite hardy in the latitude of 

 New York, but sometimes escapes injury if planted in a pro- 

 tected situation. 



H, tetraptera, L. — Silver-bell or Snow-drop Tree. — Leaves ob- 

 long, finely serrate, two to four inches long. Flowers two to 

 four in a cluster, nearly an inch long, pure white. Fruit with 

 four wings. A very handsome, small tree, if kept properly 

 pruned, otherwise it will form a large dump with several 

 stems springing from the same root. If kept to a single stem, 

 it will grow thirty or more feet high, with a stem a foot in 

 diameter. Wood light-colored, exceedingly hard, and fine 

 grained. A handsome, ornamental plant, hardy in most of 

 our Northern States. Native of Southern Illinois, Arkansas, 

 and southward to Louisiana, and eastward to North Carolina 

 and Florida. 



H, parviflora, Michx. — Small Flowered Snow-drop Tree. — 

 Leaves ovate-oblong, pointed, soft and velvety while young. 

 ^ Flowers four to five in a clustered somewhat leafy raceme. 

 Smaller than the last, and more or less tinged with red or pale- 

 rose. Fruit slender and unequally winged. Michaux gives 

 Florida as its native habitat. It appears to be a rather rare 

 shrub in cultivation, and seldom mentioned in nurserymen's 

 catalogues. I have a specimen plant in my grounds set out 

 twenty years ago, and it has never failed to bloom, showing 

 that this species is quite hardy even in our Northern States. It 

 is merely a large shrub, six to ten feet high, and the stems not 

 as large or stocky as in the other two species. 



