2 LARGE LEAVED OR AMERICAN COTINUS. 
rise beyond the height of a shrub, and had a yellow, close- 
grained, fragrant wood. 
The branches are smooth and gray, the younger ones 
brown, and rough with numerous vestiges of former pe- 
tioles. Leaves 3 to 4 inches long, by 2 to wide, the 
lower ones rhombic-ovate and obtuse, the upper ones obo- 
vate, but still somewhat narrowed at the extremity, strongly 
veined beneath, the veins pubescent even in the oldest 
leaves. Panicle less compound than in the common spe- 
cies, the hairs of the infertile peduncles more straggling, 
no infertile rudiments of flowers on the adult peduncles. 
Segments of the calyx linear-oblong. Drupe dry, rugose, 
brown, oblique, partly reniform, 2-celled, 1-seeded, the 
smaller lobe of the carpel empty. The whole plant pos- 
sesses the same aromatic odor as the true Cotinus. It is, 
no doubt, a hardy plant and deserving of cultivation, but as 
it has not been collected since I observed it, it would ap- 
pear to be scarce and very local. 
Another very distinct species of this genus also exists in 
Nepaul. There is a specimen in the Herbarium of the 
Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia, marked 
Rhus velutinum , by Dr. Wallich. It may be called 
Cotinus velutinus, the leaves are oblong-elliptic or sub- 
ovate, pubescent, beneath softly villous, the calyx and 
young peduncles are also hairy. 
The Cotinus of Europe, or Venitian Sumac, forms a 
tufted small tree from 6 to 15 feet high, and is indigenous 
to the south of France, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Siberia, 
&c. It has an elegant foliage, an agreeable citron odor, 
and the singular aspect of its woolly panicles resembling 
almost a fixed purple cloud, renders it well worthy of culti- 
vation for ornament. The wood is yellow and green, and 
is employed by musical instrument makers, ebenists, and 
turners, &c. It serves likewise for dying cloth a coffee 
