CHAP. CIV.

i'JF.TL’I.A'cK.P. 5F/TUI.A

1711

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marked than this, which appears, however, rarely tohave found a place in collections. Its leaves are nearlyas large as those of the canoe birch (B. papyracea);and they are remarkably angular. The stipules areunusually large, and more resemble those of the pla-tanus than the birch.” (Penny Cycl,')

The most northerly situation in which this treeis found in the United States is in New Jersey,about 10 miles from New York; but it is abundantin Maryland, Virginia, the upper part of the Carolinas,and in Georgia. It is not, like the other species,found growing in the midst of the forest, but only onthe banks of rivers, accompanied by the Platanusoccidentalis, A'cer eriocarpum, and some species ofwillow. It grows, with the greatest luxuriance, on thesides of limpid streams which have a gravelly bed, andthe banks of which are not marshy. The wood ofthe red birch is compact, and very nearly white; andthe colour of the sap wood and the heart wood is very nearly the same.Like that of the juneberry (Amelanchicr Botryapium), it is longitudinallymarked by red vessels, which intersect each other in different directions. Thenegroes make bowls and trays of it, when they cannot procure poplar. Thehoops for rice casks are made of its young shoots, and of branches notexceeding 1 in. in diameter; and the spray makes better brooms than thatof any other species of American birch. “Among all the birches,” saysMichaux, “ this is the only species, the growth of which is invigorated byintense heat.” For this reason, he recommends it for cultivation in Italy,and, we may add, for the temperate regions of Australia. In the climate ofLondon, it scarcely attains a timber-like size; but there is a tree of it at Syon,of which we have given a portrait in our last volume, which is 47 ft. high ; onein the Fulham Nursery, which died in 1834, was 30 ft. high ; and one at Croome,40 years planted, is 45 ft. high. In all these places it is known as B.papyracea ; which name it has obtained from the paper-like laminae of itsepidermis, which separate and curl up for the whole length of the trunk;and this not only in old trees, but in plants of three or four years’ growth.From this circumstance, it can never be mistaken for any other species ofbirch, either in winter or summer. The bark which comes nearest to it isthat of B. daurica, as represented in the engraving of the trunk of an oldtree of that species in Pallas’s Flora Bossica. There are plants at Messrs.Loddiges’s, and in several of the London nurseries. They are generallyraised from imported seeds; but seeds ripen in this country, when the treehas attained the age of six or eight years. Plants, in the London nurseries,are from Is. to Is. 6 d. each ; and seeds Is. per quart. At New York, plantsare 25 cents each, and seeds 1 dollar and 50 cents per pound, 50 cents perquart, or 8 dollars per bushel.

£ 10. B. exce'lsa H. Kew. The tall Birch.

Identification. Ait. Hort. Kew., 3. p. 337- ; Willd. Sp. PI., 4. p. 464., Baum., p. 60.; Pursh FI.Amer. Sept., 2. p. 261.; N. Du Ham., 3. p. 203.

Synonymes. B. ldtea Michx. Arb ., 2. p. 152.; ? B. nigra Du Roi Herb. Baum ., ]. p. 148. ; yellowBirch, Atner.

Engravings. Michx. Arb., 2. t. 5. ; Wats. Dend. Brit., t. 95.; N. Du Ham., 3. t. 52.; Willd. Baum.,t. 1. f. 2.; and our fig. 1564. from Michaux, and fig. 1565. from the Nouv. Du Ham.

Spec. Char., $c. Leaves ovate, acute, serrated; petioles pubescent, shorterthan the peduncles. Scales of the strobiles having the side lobes roundish.{Willd. Sp. PL, iv. p.464.) Atree, from 70 ft. to 80 ft. high, in NorthAmerica; and flowering there in May and June. Introduced about 1767.Description, Sfc. The specific name of excelsa, Michaux observes, is in-judiciously applied to this species, as it leads to an erroneous opinion that itsurpasses every other in height. It is a beautiful tree, and its trunk is of

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