4 
PRIDE OF INDIA. 
tree. Like the Locust, it possesses the valuable property of converting its 
sap into perfect wood in the earliest stages of its growth ; a stock 6 inches 
in diameter has only an inch of sap, and consequently may be employed 
almost entire. The wood is of a reddish color, and is similarly organized 
with that of the Ash : it receives a less brilliant polish than the Red Bay, 
the Wild Cherry, the Maple and the Sweet Gum ; but this defect is unim- 
portant in a country which possesses the species just mentioned and can 
easily procure Mahogany. The Pride of India is sufficiently durable and 
strong to be useful in building, and it will probably be found adapted to 
various mechanical uses ; it has already been employed for pullies, which 
in Europe are made of Elm, and in America of Ash. I have been assured 
that it is excellent fuel. 
This succinct description deserves attention in the southern parts of 
North America, andin those countries of Europe where the Pride of India 
is considered as an ornamental rather than as an useful tree. Fields 
exhausted by cultivation and abandoned, might be profitably covered with 
it. 
PLATE OIL 
A leaf of a third part of the natural size. Fig. 1 . Flowers of the natural size. 
Fig. 2, Seeds of the natural size. 
[The Pride of India cannot be considered hardy as far north as Phila- 
delphia, where its limbs are killed regularly every year ; the root survives, 
and stools are again produced in the spring.] 
