Part 95

Small trees or shrubs, with slender terete branches, without a terminal bud, and small scaly axillary buds. Leaves petiolate, 3-ribbed from the base, or pinnately veined, persistent in the arborescent species. Flowers on colored pedicels, in umbellate fascicles collected in dense or prolonged terminal or axillary thyrsoid cymes or panicles, blue or white; calyx colored, with a turbinate or hemispheric tube and 5 triangular membranaceous petaloid lobes; disk fleshy, thickened above; petals 5, inserted under the margin of the disk, unguiculate, wide-spreading, deciduous, the long claw infolded round the stamens; stamens 5, inserted with and opposite the petals, persistent, filaments spreading; ovary partly immersed in and more or less adnate to the disk, 3-celled, sometimes 3-angled, the angles often surmounted by a fleshy gland persistent on the fruit; styles short, united below; stigmas 3-lobed with spreading lobes; ovule erect from the base of the cell. Fruit 3-lobed, subglobose, with a thin outer coat, soon becoming dry, and separating into 3 crustaceous or cartilaginous longitudinally 2-valved nutlets. Seeds erect, obovoid, lenticellate, with a broad basal excrescence surrounding the hilum; seed-coat thin, crustaceous; albumen fleshy; embryo axile; cotyledons oval or obovate.

Ceanothus is confined to the temperate and warmer regions of North America, with about thirty species, mostly belonging to California. The leaves, bark, and roots are astringent and tonic. Of the species of the United States three are small trees.

The generic name is from κεάνωθος, the classical name of some spiny plant.

CONSPECTUS OF THE ARBORESCENT SPECIES OF THE UNITED STATES.

Branchlets not spinose, leaves 3-ribbed. Leaves broad-ovate to elliptic, subcordate or rounded at base, pale and tomentose below. 1. C. arboreus (G). Leaves elliptic, acute at base, glabrous except on the veins below. 2. C. thyrsiflorus (G). Branchlets spinose; leaves with a single midrib, mostly elliptic, rounded or subcordate at base, glabrous. 3. C. spinosus (G).

1. Ceanothus arboreus Greene.

Leaves broad-ovate or elliptic, acute, conspicuously glandular-crenate, dark green and softly puberulent on the upper surface, pale and densely tomentose on the lower surface, 2½′—4′ long and 1′—2½′ wide, with prominent veins; petioles stout, pubescent, ½′—1′ in length; stipules subulate from a broad triangular base, ¼′ long. Flowers pale blue opening in July and August, on slender hairy pedicels ½′—1′ long, from the axils of large scarious caducous bracts, in ample compound densely hoary-pubescent thyrsoid clusters 3′—4′ long and 1½′—2′ wide, on a leafy or naked axillary peduncle at the end of young branches. Fruit black, ¼′ across.

A round-headed tree, 20°—25° high, with a straight trunk 6′—10′ in diameter, dividing 4°—5° from the ground into many stout spreading branches, and slender slightly angled pale brown branchlets covered with short dense tomentum, becoming in their second season terete, nearly glabrous, roughened with scattered lenticels and marked by large elevated leaf-scars; often a shrub. Bark of the trunk dark brown, about ⅛′ thick, and broken into small square plates separating into thick scales.

Distribution. Santa Catalina, Santa Cruz, and Santa Rosa Islands of the Santa Barbara group off the coast of southern California; most abundant and of its largest size on the northern slopes of Santa Cruz; on the other islands usually shrubby, with numerous slender stems.

2. Ceanothus thyrsiflorus Eschs. Blue Myrtle. California Lilac.

Leaves oblong or oblong-ovate, minutely glandular-serrate, smooth and lustrous on the upper surface and paler and slightly pubescent on the lower surface, especially along the 3 prominent ribs, 1′—1½′ long and ½′—1′ wide; petioles stout, ⅓′—½′ in length; stipules membranaceous, acute. Flowers blue or white, appearing in early spring in small pedunculate corymbs from the axils of minute deciduous bracts, and collected into slender rather loose thyrsoid clusters 2′—3′ long in the axils of upper leaves or of small scarious bracts, and usually surmounted by the terminal leafy shoot of the branch. Fruit ripening from July to December, black; seeds 1/12′ long, smooth, dark brown or nearly black.

A tree, occasionally 35° high, with a trunk 12′—14′ in diameter, dividing 5°—6° from the ground into many small wide-spreading branches, and conspicuously angled pale yellow-green branchlets slightly pubescent when they first appear, soon becoming glabrous; more often a tall or low shrub. Bark of the trunk thin, with a bright red-brown surface separating into thin narrow appressed scales. Wood close-grained, rather soft, light brown, with thin darker colored sapwood.

Distribution. Shady hillsides on the borders of the forest and often in the neighborhood of streams; coast mountains of California from Mendocino County to the valley of the San Luis Rey River, San Diego County; of its largest size northward, and in the Redwood-forests of the Santa Cruz Mountains; southward often a low shrub, frequently flowering on the wind-swept shores of the ocean when only 1°—2° high.

3. Ceanothus spinosus Nutt. Lilac.

Leaves elliptic to oblong, full and rounded, apiculate or often slightly emarginate or gradually narrowed and pointed or rarely 3-lobed at apex, and rounded or cuneate at base, when they unfold villose-pubescent below along the stout midrib and obscure primary veins, soon glabrous, coriaceous, usually about 1′ long and ½′ wide; petioles stout, ⅙′—⅓′ in length, at first villose, becoming nearly glabrous; leaves on vigorous shoots sometimes ovate, conspicuously 3-nerved, irregularly serrate with incurved apiculate teeth, or coarsely dentate, and often 1½′ long and ⅝′ wide; stipules minute, acute. Flowers light or dark blue, very fragrant, opening from March until May, in lax corymbs from the axils of acute pubescent red caducous bracts on upper leafy branchlets of the year, the whole inflorescence forming an open thyrsus often 5′—6′ long and 3′—4′ thick, leafless toward the apex. Fruit depressed, obscurely lobed, crestless, black, ¼′—⅓′ in diameter.

A tree, 18°—20° high, with a trunk 5′—6′ in diameter, upright branches forming a narrow open head, and slender divaricate angled branchlets pubescent or puberulous when they first appear, soon glabrous, bright green, ultimately reddish brown, frequently terminating in sharp leafless thorn-like points; more often shrubby. Bark of the trunk thin, red-brown, roughened by small closely appressed scales.

Distribution. California, common in mountain cañons near the coast of Santa Barbara, Ventura, and Los Angeles Counties; often forming a dense undergrowth in the forest, which it enlivens for many weeks in early spring by its large clusters of bright blue flowers.

6. COLUBRINA Brong.

Trees or shrubs, with terete branches and scaly buds. Leaves alternate, petiolate, pinnately veined or triple-veined from the base, often ferrugineo-tomentose on the lower surface, persistent. Flowers axillary, in contracted few-flowered cymes or fascicles, yellow or greenish yellow; calyx-tube hemispheric, persistent, 5-lobed, the lobes spreading, triangular-ovate, keeled on the inner surface, deciduous by a circumscissile line; disk fleshy, annular, 5-angled or indistinctly 5 or 10-lobed; petals 5 yellow or white, inserted under the margin of the disk, shorter than the lobes of the calyx, cucullate, unguiculate, infolding the stamens; stamens 5, opposite to and inserted with the petals; filaments incurved; anthers ovoid; ovary surrounded by and confluent with the disk, 3-celled, subglobose, contracted into a slender 3-lobed style, the obtuse lobes stigmatic on the inner face; ovule erect, from the base of the cell. Fruit subglobose, 3-lobed, the outer coat thin and septicidally dehiscent into 3 1-seeded crustaceous nutlets 2-valved at apex. Seeds erect, broad-obovoid, compressed, 3-angled; seed-coat coriaceous, smooth and shining; embryo axile in thick fleshy albumen; cotyledons orbicular, flat or incurved, thin or fleshy.

Colubrina with about a dozen species is confined to the tropics, with the largest number of species in the New World. Of the four species found within the territory of the United States three are arborescent.

The generic name is from _coluber_, a serpent, probably on account of the peculiar twisting of the deep furrows on the stems of some of the species.

CONSPECTUS OF THE ARBORESCENT SPECIES OF THE UNITED STATES.

Leaves thin, elliptic, ovate or lanceolate, glabrous at maturity. 1. C. reclinata (D). Leaves thick or coriaceous. Leaves oblong to elliptic, rounded or acute at apex, densely soft-pubescent. 2. C. cubensis (D). Leaves elliptic to ovate-lanceolate, bluntly pointed at apex, coriaceous, rusty-pubescent beneath. 3. C. arborescens (D).

1. Colubrina reclinata Brong. Naked Wood.

Leaves elliptic, ovate or lanceolate, usually contracted at apex into a blunt point, cuneate or somewhat rounded and furnished with 2 conspicuous marginal glands at base, and entire when they unfold in early summer thin, glabrous or finely puberulent below and along the principal veins, and at maturity thin, yellow-green, 2½′—3′ long and 1½′ to nearly 2′ wide, with a stout midrib and arcuate primary veins; persistent until their second year; petioles slender, ½′ in length. Flowers in cymes rather shorter than the petioles, on shoots of the year, pubescent, soon becoming glabrate. Fruit ¼′ in diameter and dark orange-red, ripening late in the autumn, on pedicels ½′ in length; seeds light red-brown, ⅛′ long.

A tree, 50°—60° high, with a trunk 3°—4° in diameter, divided by numerous irregular deep furrows multiplying and spreading in all directions, and branchlets slightly angled when they first appear, puberulent and reddish brown, soon becoming glabrate, and in their second season nearly terete, gray or light brown, and marked by numerous small light-colored lenticels. Bark of the trunk thin, orange-brown, exfoliating in large papery scales. Wood heavy, hard, very strong, dark brown tinged with yellow, with thin light yellow sapwood of 8—10 layers of annual growth.

Distribution. Florida, on Umbrella Key, the north end of Key Largo, and on some of the small keys south of Elliott’s Key; of its largest size and forming a forest of considerable extent on Umbrella Key; on the Bahama Islands and on many of the Antilles.

2. Colubrina cubensis Brong.

Leaves oblong to elliptic, gradually narrowed and rounded or acute and apiculate at apex, rounded or cuneate at the often unsymmetric base, slightly crenulate-serrate with broad rounded teeth, thick, dull dark green and soft-pubescent on the upper surface, pale and pubescent on the lower surface, 3½′—5′ long and 1¼′—1½′ wide, with a prominent pubescent yellow midrib and slender primary veins; petioles slender, yellow, densely pubescent, ⅓′—½′ in length; stipules linear-lanceolate, long-acuminate, pubescent, ⅓′ in length. Flowers minute on pedicels ⅙′ long, from the axils of ovate acuminate villose caducous bracts, in villose cymes on peduncles longer than the petioles; calyx densely pubescent, the lobes triangular, ovate, acute, about as long as the yellow petals. Fruit globose, about ⅓′ in diameter.

A tree in Florida from 20°—30° high, with a trunk 6′—8′ in diameter (_teste J. K. Small_) and slender light red-brown pubescent branchlets.

Distribution. Florida, hummocks of the Everglade Keys, Dade County; on the Bahama Islands and in Cuba and Hispaniola.

3. Colubrina arborescens Sarg.

_Colubrina Colubrina_ Mills.

Leaves coriaceous, persistent, elliptic to ovate-lanceolate, gradually narrowed and bluntly pointed at apex, narrowed and rounded or cuneate at base, entire, dark green, glabrous and lustrous on the upper surface, pale and coated on the lower surface with thick rusty pubescence and sometimes marked by conspicuous glands mostly at the end of small veins, 2′—4½′ long and 1¼′—2½′ wide, with a thick midrib; petioles stout, rusty-pubescent, ½′—¾′ in length; stipules oblong, acuminate, rusty-pubescent, caducous. Flowers minute, in axillary cymes shorter than the petioles, covered with persistent rusty pubescence and generally produced on short axillary branches; petals white or nearly white. Fruit on a stout rusty-pubescent pedicel, about ½′ long, on a much thickened peduncle, obovoid to subglobose, dark purple or nearly black, 5/12′ in diameter; nutlets light yellow; seed about ⅙′ long.

A tree, sometimes 25° high, with a straight trunk 8′—12′ in diameter, large erect branches and stout branchlets densely rusty-pubescent when they first appear, and light gray, puberulous and marked by small dark lenticels in their second year; in Florida more often a shrub.

Distribution. Florida, on the Everglade and southern keys; on the Bahama Islands and on several of the Antilles.

XXXIX. TILIACEÆ.

Trees, shrubs, or herbs, with alternate simple leaves, and free stipules. Flowers regular, perfect; sepals valvate in the bud, deciduous; corolla hypogynous; stamens numerous, with 2-celled anthers, the cells opening longitudinally; pistil compound; styles united into 1; stigma capitate. Fruit capsular or nut-like. Seeds with albumen; embryo with broad foliaceous cotyledons.

The Linden family with forty-four genera is chiefly tropical, with more representatives in the southern than in the northern hemisphere. Of the three North American genera only Tilia is arborescent.

1. TILIA L. Bass Wood. Linden.

Trees, with terete moderately stout branchlets, without a terminal bud, large compressed acute axillary buds, with numerous imbricated scales, those of the inner rank accrescent, mucilaginous juice, and tough fibrous inner bark. Leaves conduplicate in the bud, long-petiolate, 2-ranked, cordate or truncate at the oblique base, acute or acuminate, serrate, deciduous, their petioles in falling leaving large elevated horizontal leaf-scars displaying the ends of numerous fibro-vascular bundles; stipules ligulate, membranaceous, caducous. Flowers nectariferous, fragrant, on slender clavate pedicels, in axillary or terminal cymes, with minute caducous bracts at the base of the branches, their peduncle more or less connate with the axis of a large membranaceous light green ligulate often obovate persistent conspicuously reticulate-veined bract; sepals 5, distinct; petals 5, imbricated in the bud, alternate with the sepals, sometimes thickened and glandular at the narrow base, creamy white or yellow, deciduous; stamens inserted on a short hypogynous receptacle; filaments filiform, forked near the apex, collected into 5 clusters and united at base with each other and (in the American species) with a spatulate petaloid scale (_staminodium_) placed opposite each petal, the branches of the filament bearing oblong extrorse half anthers; ovary sessile, tomentose, 5-celled, the cells opposite the sepals; style erect, dilated at apex into 5 spreading stigmatic lobes; ovules 2 in each cell, ascending from the middle of its inner angle, semianatropous, the micropyle centripetal-inferior. Fruit nut-like, woody, subglobose to short-oblong or ovoid, sometimes ribbed, tomentose, 1-celled by the obliteration of the partitions, 1 or 2-seeded. Seeds obovoid, amphitropous, ascending; seed-coat cartilaginous, light reddish brown; embryo large, often curved, in fleshy albumen; cotyledons reniform or cordate, palmately 5-lobed, the margins irregularly involute or crumpled; radicle inferior.

Tilia with some thirty species is widely distributed in the temperate regions of the northern hemisphere with the exception of western America, central Asia, and the Himalayas. Tilia produces soft straight-grained pale-colored light wood, largely used for the interior finish of buildings, in cabinet-making, for the sounding-boards of pianos, wood-carving and wooden ware, and in the manufacture of paper. The tough inner bark is largely manufactured into mats, cords, fish-nets, coarse cloths, and shoes. Lime-flower oil, obtained by distilling the flowers of the European species, is used in perfumery. The flowers yield large quantities of nectar, and honey made near forests of Tilia is unsurpassed in flavor and delicacy. Many of the species are planted as shade and ornamental trees, and some of the European species are now common in the gardens and parks of the eastern United States.

CONSPECTUS OF THE SPECIES OF THE UNITED STATES.

Surface of the leaves glabrous at maturity. Leaves glabrous or almost glabrous when they unfold, coarsely serrate. Leaves furnished with conspicuous tufts of axillary hairs, their lower surface light green and lustrous; pedicels glabrous or nearly glabrous. 1. T. glabra (A). Leaves usually without tufts of axillary hairs, their lower surface not lustrous; pedicels densely hoary-tomentose. 2. T. nuda (C). Leaves hoary-tomentose when they unfold. Leaves soon glabrous. Leaves coarsely serrate with stout teeth, their veinlets conspicuous; branchlets stout, bright red. 3. T. venulosa (A). Leaves finely serrate with straight or incurved teeth, their veinlets less conspicuous; branchlets slender, pale reddish brown. 4. T. littoralis (C). Leaves crenately serrate, glaucescent on the lower surface. 5. T. crenoserrata (C). Leaves covered below early in the season with articulate hairs, becoming glabrous or nearly glabrous. Leaves thin, coarsely serrate, green or glaucescent on the lower surface, with or without tufts of axillary hairs; summer shoots not pubescent. 6. T. floridana (C). Leaves subcoriaceous, finely serrate, bluish green and lustrous below early in the season; tufts of axillary hairs minute, usually wanting; summer shoots pubescent. 7. T. Cocksii (C). Surface of the leaves pubescent below during the season. Lower surface of the leaves covered with short gray firmly attached pubescence; tufts of axillary hairs not conspicuous. 8. T. neglecta (A, C). Lower surface of the leaves covered with articulate easily detached hairs. Branchlets without straight hairs. Leaves ovate, acuminate, usually obliquely truncate at base, glabrous above, their pubescence brownish or white. 9. T. caroliniana (C). Leaves oblong-ovate, cordate or obliquely cordate at base, pubescent above early in the season. 10. T. texana (C). Leaves semiorbicular to broad-ovate, abruptly short-pointed, deeply and usually symmetrically cordate at base. 11. T. phanera (C). Branchlets covered with straight hairs; leaves ovate, abruptly short-pointed, oblique and truncate at base. 12. T. lasioclada (C). Surface of the leaves tomentose below during the season with close firmly attached tomentum. Tomentum white, gray, or brown; leaves usually glabrous on the upper surface; branchlets and winter-buds glabrous (_occasionally pubescent in varieties of 13_). Branchlets slender; petioles not more than 1½′ in length; leaves oblong-ovate, acuminate or abruptly pointed, oblique and truncate or cordate at base; tomentum on the leaves of upper branches often brown; flowers ¼′—⅓′ long. 13. T. heterophylla (A, C). Branchlets stout; petioles up to 3′ in length; leaves oblong-ovate, acuminate, obliquely truncate at base; tomentum always white; flowers 5/12′½′ long. 14. T. monticola (A). Tomentum pale or brownish; leaves thickly covered above early in the season with fascicled hairs; branchlets tomentose; winter-buds pubescent. 15. T. georgiana (C).

1. Tilia glabra Vent. Linden. Bass Wood.

_Tilia americana_ L.

Leaves broad-ovate, contracted at apex into a slender acuminate entire point, obliquely cordate or sometimes almost truncate at base, coarsely serrate with incurved glandular teeth, often slightly pubescent when they first appear soon glabrous with the exception of tufts of rusty brown hairs in the axils of the principal veins below, thick and firm, dark dull green on the upper surface, lighter, yellow-green and lustrous on the lower surface, 5′—6′ long and 3′—4′ wide; turning pale yellow in the autumn before falling; petioles slender, 1½′—2′ in length. Flowers ½′ long, opening early in July on slender slightly angled pubescent pedicels, in few-flowered slender-branched glabrous cymes; peduncle slender, glabrous, the free portion 3½′—4′ long, its bract rounded or pointed at apex, 4′—5′ long, 1′—1½′ wide, decurrent nearly to the base or to within ½′—1′ of the base of the peduncle; sepals ovate, acuminate, densely hairy on the inner surface and slightly pubescent on the outer surface, a third shorter than the lanceolate petals; staminodia oblong-obovate, bluntly pointed at apex, a third shorter than the petals; ovary villose; style covered with rufous tomentum. Fruit short-oblong to oblong-obovoid, rounded or pointed at apex, ⅓′—½′ long, and covered with short thick rufous tomentum.

A tree, usually 60°—70°, or sometimes 120°—130° high, with a tall trunk 3°—4° in diameter, small often pendulous branches forming a broad round-topped head, slender smooth glabrous light gray or light brown branchlets marked by numerous oblong dark lenticels, becoming darker in their second and dark gray or brown and conspicuously rugose in their third year. Winter-buds dark red, ovoid, about ¼′ long. Bark of the trunk about 1′ thick, deeply furrowed, the light brown surface broken into small thin scales. Wood light brown faintly tinged with red, with thick hardly distinguishable sapwood of 55—65 layers of annual growth; employed in the manufacture of paper pulp, and under the name of white wood largely used in wooden ware, cheap furniture, the panels of carriages, and for the inner soles of shoes.

Distribution. Rich often moist soil, formerly often in nearly pure forests; northern New Brunswick to the eastern shores of Lake Superior, the southern shores of Lake Winnipeg and the valley of the Assiniboine River, and southward to Pennsylvania, Ohio, eastern Kentucky, southern Michigan, Indiana and Illinois, eastern Nebraska and northern Missouri.

Often cultivated as a shade and ornamental tree in the northeastern states, and occasionally in Europe.

2. Tilia nuda Sarg.