52 
NARROW LEAVED BALSAM POPLAR. 
POPULUS angustifolia; foliis ovato-lanceolatis lanceola- 
tisve acutis, superne attenuatis penninerviis concoloribus 
glabris adpresso-serratis; ramulis leretibus glabris, gem- 
mis resinosis. 
P. angustifolia, Torrey, Lyceum Nat. Hist. N. York, vol. 2. 
p. 249. 
Narrow Leaved Cotton-wood , of Lewis and Clarke. 
As we ascended the banks of the river Platte, in our 
extended journey to the West, about Larimie’s Fork, a 
northern branch of that extensive stream, we observed 
scarcely any other tree along the alluvial plains but the 
present and the Cotton-wood, and those were chiefly 
confined to the islands, a circumstance accounted for 
by the annual burning of the prairies, which wholly 
strips the streams of their margin of forest, so that we 
behold far and wide nothing but a vast plain, a sea of 
grass undulating before the breeze, and the illusion 
appears more sensible by the fact, that the only varia- 
tion to the scene is produced by the scattered islands 
of the lofty Poplar which gives life and variety to the 
wild and boundless landscape. 
The height of this species, which so nearly resembles 
the Balsam Poplar, may be about 60 to 100 feet, having 
a trunk of proportionate diameter, clad like the Cotton- 
wood with a rough greyish bark. Although a brittle 
and poor wood for almost every purpose, it will, like 
the Cotton-wood of the Mississippi, ( Populus angulata,') 
become of necessity important for fence and fuel, when- 
ever this country shall become settled, as scarcely any 
other timber exists in sufficient quantity for economical 
