198 
LETTERS FROM ALABAMA. 
of eacli division of this legume is coated witli a 
thick glutinous pulp, as sweet as sugar, giving the 
name to the tree ; the pods are often chewed for 
this substance ; the seeds, which are many in num- 
ber, hard and brown, are arranged side by side, as 
the common pea. 
A very singular appendage is found on a com- 
mon species of Elm, called the Wahoo (JJlmus 
alatd). The smaller branches and twigs have the 
bark dilated on two opposite sides into a flat edge, 
about a quarter of an inch wide, of a tough elastic 
texture, much like cork in appearance, which ex- 
tends through their whole length, much more regu- 
larly than in the English Elm. ' 
One of our commonest trees is the Sweet Gum 
[Liquidamhar styracijlua) , which grows to a large 
size both in swamps and in dry woods. Its foliage 
much resembles that of a maple, the leaves being 
five-lobed, but the lobes are more regular than in 
that genus, and finely toothed. They are of a 
beautiful green hue, and give out, when rubbed, a 
fragrance something like that of the lemon-tree, 
but inferior. In the angles formed by the main 
nerves, which diverge from the base of the leaf, 
there is a little mass of down, which is character- 
istic of the genus. The flowers are inconspicuous, 
the barren and the fertile ones being on distinct 
branches : the latter succeeded by a singular fruit, 
consisting of numerous capsules agglomerated into 
a ball of an inch and a half in diameter, from 
which the points of the capsules project in every 
direction; it hangs from a petiole two or three 
inches long. These globes are green, but become 
yellow when ripe, and then the capsules burst, and 
allow the exit of little winged seeds, like those of 
