LARGE LEAVED MAPLE. 
79 
lated or curled, — other portions present the numerous con- 
centric spots which constitute the Bird’s-eye Maple; and 
so frequent is this structure, that nearly every large tree 
which was cut down afforded one or other of these varieties 
of wood. As yet, in those remote and unsettled regions, it 
has only afforded a beautiful and curious material for the 
gun-stock of the savage or the hunter. Like the Sugar 
Maple also, it affords an abundance of saccharine sap, 
which to an infant settlement, may one day be turned to 
advantage. As an ornamental plant, it stands pre-eminent ; 
and from the latitude it occupies it must be entirely hardy 
in every part of Europe below the latitude of 60°. The 
young trees are often tall, slender and graceful, and when 
in blossom, which is about the month of April, present a 
very imposing appearance, clad with numerous drooping 
racemes of rather conspicuous yellowish and somewhat 
fragrant flow'ers. At an after period, the spreading sum- 
mit of deep green leaves, each near a foot in diameter, 
affords an impervious and complete shade. The fruit or 
carpels are also larger than usual, and have the remark- 
able character of being clothed, even when ripe, w-ith 
strong hispid hairs. The flowers, irregular in the number 
of their parts, present often as many as 10 sepals, in two 
rows, and the same number of stamens. The carpels or 
seed-vessels also grow sometimes as many as 3 together. 
According to Loudon, specimens of the timber, which 
were sent home by Douglas, exhibit a grain scarcely infe- 
rior in beauty to the finest satin wood. A tree grown in 
the London Horticultural Society’s Garden, had in 1835, 
attained the height of 25 feet, and it makes, when well cul- 
tivated, annual shoots of from 6 to 10 feet in length, and 
plants are to be had in London at half a crown a-piece. 
It deserves to be cultivated also in the United States, as it 
is one of the most useful and ornamental trees of the genus, 
