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FIR. 



Family: CONIFERS [Translator's note: now PINACEAE]. 

 Reproductive system: MONOECY, MONADELPHY. 



The Norway spruce, A hies picea, Pinus abies, Linn., is a large tree of our forests. 

 It's found in the mountains of the Auvergne, in the Pyrenees, and in the Alps where it 

 grows a hundred or a hundred and twenty feet high. Its foliage is a dark and very deep 

 green. The branches, open and often pendent, bear angular leaves that are sharp, thin, 

 close together, and green on both sides. The male flowers form catkins composed of 

 scales that cover two sessile anthers. The female flowers likewise are in catkins. They're 

 formed from bracts adherent to a central axis. Each scale has two ovaries that develop 

 into two monospermous nuts terminating in a membranous wing and located on the upper 

 side of the scale. The scales join to form the fruit or cone, which always points 

 downward. 



FLOWERS: at the end of winter. 



RANGE: France and Europe, as far as Norway and Lapland. 



NOMENCLATURE. Picea, producing pitch [Translator's note: Latin: pix]. Gernan, 

 die fichte, fiech. Dutch, hartsboom. English, the pitch-tree. Italian, picea. Russian, jal. 

 Polish, swierk. Hungarian, szomdrke-fa. Lapp, guesa. Colloquial French, la pece, la 

 pesse, lefaux sapin. 



The red fir, Abies rubra, Lambert, is a not very tall tree from North America that 

 has been naturalized in France and in England for a number of years. Its leaves are 

 solitary and tetragonal. The fruit is oblong, blunt, red or reddish in color, formed of 

 rounded scales entire on the margins and sometimes slightly indented at the tip. 



RANGE: North America. 



