EVERGREEN TREES AND SHRUBS, 
515 
THE PINES. Finns. 
The hardy pines of the temperate zone will be grouped in three 
divisions : First, those which are indigenous on the Atlantic slope 
of the United States ; second, those which are indigenous on the Pa- 
cific slope of the United States, including a few from the highlands 
of Mexico ; third, those which are indigenous in Europe and Asia. 
The latter division embraces a larger number than the others of 
species which have proved desirable for embellishment ; and from 
the fact that the most valuable of these have been in cultivation for 
many centuries, and developed many interesting varieties, they are 
rendered additionally interesting. 
Pine trees are generally distinguished from other families of 
evergreens by the greater length of their needle leaves, and the fact 
of their being grouped in two’s, three’s, and five’s, issuing from a 
common sheath. Botanists classify them, in part, by the number 
of leaves to the sheath. 
Pines of the United States on the Atlantic Slope. 
The White Pine. Finns strobns . — Though in one kind of 
beauty or another, separately considered, the white pine may be 
excelled by many other trees, we know of no hardy evergreen of 
the temperate zone that unites so many elements of beauty, pictur- 
esqueness and utility, as this noble native of our own forests. In 
grandeur of elevation, and in the beauty of its columnar trunk, 
regarded merely as a forest tree, it ranks among trees east of the 
Rocky Mountains as the red-wood or big-tree {sequoia) and Doug- 
lass spruce of California among the more colossal trees of the 
Pacific slope. The white pine forests of Maine, New York, and the 
northwestern States, furnish our country with more than half of all 
the w^ood used in its buildings. It is recorded on high authority 
that trees have been cut in Maine measuring upwards of two 
hundred feet in height. Frigate main-masts one hundred and eight 
feet in length have been made of single pieces of its timber. The 
fact that this tree is of such vast use in the arts has caused it to be 
