THE NATIVE TREES OE RHODE ISLAND. 
27 
The smaller “ aspen ” poplar grows everywhere, and is one of the 
last of trees to hang out its jaunty tassels in arctic regions. It 
seems like a vagrant when it hides in old gravel-pits, and creeps 
along sand-banks and railroad-cuts. 
The “ Balm of Gilead ” is a poplar, and is probably associated, 
in the memory of many, with bruises, cut fingers, stubbed toes, 
and the like. Our grandmothers looked out to have one of these 
trees set near the house ; and it grew fast, and shortly yielded the 
aromatic, healing wax from its well protected buds. The patented 
“healers” of the drug stores are poor substitutes for nature’s 
remedies. This tree is probably native to this State, and may be 
seen, often broken and neglected, around many of the old country 
homes. It deserves a better fate. Its healing virtues have not 
diminished. 
The Tulip Tree. 
It is in place here to speak briefly of one of the choicest orna- 
mental trees of our latitude, the “ tulip.” 
The name recalls a beautiful flower of our borders, and the 
tree, in early June, mingles with its leaves flowers equally attrac- 
tive. The petals of the flower form a vase-like chalice, shaded 
with orange and green, .of notable beauty and symmetry. The 
leaves seem almost too formal for nature’s work, but their shape is 
distinctively their own. Their truncated apex is peculiar. Their 
lively green in summer, and orange shades in autumn, make them 
attractive the season through. The tree is tall and stately, and 
architectural in its entire composition. Its formal characteristics 
make^t harmonize well with dressed grounds and artificial sur- 
roundings. It appears perfectly hardy with us, and seems not to 
mind the dust and smoke of the city. Its shade is not very dense, 
but sufficient for a lawn tree, and for certain places near dwellings. 
The tree is so rare in this State, as a native, that it is hardly 
known by a name at all appropriate. Some of the inhabitants 
around Wallum pond, where the writer found it wild in the woods, 
called it the “flowering maple others, the “high dogwood.” A 
