DECIDUOUS ORNAMENTAL TREES. 
131 
streets and avenues, the greater portion of their peculial 
loveliness. The elm should not be chosen where large 
groups and masses are required, as the similarity of its 
form in different individuals might then create a mo- 
notony ; but as wq have before observed, it is peculiarly 
well calculated for small groups, or as a single object.. 
The roughness of the bark, contrasting with the lightness 
of its foliage and the easy sweep of its branches, adds 
much also to its effect as a whole. 
We shall briefly describe the principal species of the 
elm. 
The American White elm. {Ulmus Americana.) This 
is the best known and most generally distributed of our 
native species, growing in greater or less profusion over 
the whole of the country included between Lower Canada 
and the Gulf of Mexico. It often reaches 80 feet in 
height in fine soils, with a diameter of 4 or 5 feet. The 
leaves are alternate, 3 or 4 inches long, unequal in size 
at the base, borne on petioles half an inch to an inch in 
length, oval, acuminate, and doubly denticulated. The 
seeds are contained in a flat, oval, winged seed-vessel, 
fringed with small hairs on the margin. The flowers, 
of a dull purple color, are borne in small bunches on 
short footstalks at the end of the branches, and appear 
very early in the spring. This tree prefers a deep rich 
soil, and grows with greater luxuriance if it be rather 
moist, often reaching in such situations an altitude of 
nearly 100 feet. It is found in the greatest perfection in 
the alluvial soils of the fertile valleys of the Connecticut, 
the Mississippi, and the Ohio rivers. 
The Red or Slippery elm. ( U . fulva.) A tree of 
