Beside the needle-leaved evergreens just described, there are some trees
we all know, that bear cones, and are evergreens, but their leaves are
strangely different from those of pines, spruces, firs, and hemlocks. One
of these is the familiar arbor vitæ, a conical tree, with flat leaf
spray. Looking closely, one can make out the tiny, scale-like leaves,
arranged in opposite pairs, clasping the wiry stems, and covering them
completely. These stems are flat, so that one pair of leaves has a sharp
keel on the middle. The next pair is spread out flat. The keeled pair
covers the edge of the stem. The flat pair covers the broader surface.
These pairs alternate through the length of the stem, and an aromatic
resin seals them close.
The cones of the arbor vitæ are small, and they have few scales, compared
with the cones of the needle-leaved evergreens. Each year a crop is
borne, with two seeds under each scale. Few of us see the little red cone
flowers in May, nor the pellets of yellow on other twigs, which are the
pollen flowers. We watch the hedge clipper at work, trimming the thick
green fronds that make a solid wall of green. Look carefully hereafter
for the flowers and the ripe cones, in the proper season for each.
[Illustration: This big tree, “The Grizzly Giant,” is over three hundred
feet high. It is a sequoia, one of the cone-bearing evergreens]
[Illustration: SCALY-LEAVED EVERGREENS: Upper: two branches from the same
red cedar tree; Lower: flat sprays of arbor vitæ]
The white cedar grows, a fine, conical evergreen tree, in the coast
states, from Maine to Mississippi. It loves best the deep swamps, but
grows well in wet, sandy soil farther inland. Here we see again the flat
spray of minute, pointed, and keeled leaves, but the cones are different.
These are pale grey, and globular; the few scales are thick and horny,
and curiously sculptured, each with a beak projecting from the centre.
The foliage mass is a peculiar blue-green, and the bark, thin, and rusty
red, parts into strings and shreds.
Lumbermen call this tree a cedar. So they do the arbor vitæ. The wood of
each is pale-coloured, and notable for its durability when exposed to
weather and water. Fence posts of white cedar, and cedar pails, shingles,
and the like, have a great reputation for durability.
The peculiarity of a red cedar is its fruit. Instead of a cone, a blue,
juicy, sweet berry follows the blossoming of this tree. The foliage, too,
is erratic. Minute leaves of the scale form, discovered in the other
cedars, are found here on most twigs. They are still smaller, and the
twigs are much smaller. But on new shoots, and often on a whole branch,
the leaves are needle-like, one-half to three-quarters of an inch long,
and spreading as the leaves of a spruce. The mass of the foliage is
blue-green; these new ones are yellow-green. Among the branches hang
these surprising berries!
The truth is that the scales of the cone thicken, and become soft when
ripe. They grow together, and the berry is, therefore, a cone, but much
changed in its development from the cone on which the fruits of other
evergreen trees are patterned.
We all know a red cedar tree by its tall, slim shape. The birds eat the
berries, and scatter the seeds far and wide. The trees come up in
irregular clumps in pastures and fence-rows, and in rough, uncultivated
land. They are pretty widely distributed in the eastern half of the
United States.
The true name for this tree is juniper. That is the name by which all its
related species are known. Red cedar is the lumberman’s name for its
wood, and this name, though not right, will probably stick to it always.
Red cedar chests and closets are believed to be moth-proof. The aromatic
resin in the wood is supposed to be distasteful to the insects which are
the pests of housekeepers. To put furs and woollen blankets and clothing
into these chests does not always prevent their being moth-eaten. This
many people have learned by sorrowful experience. We know the fragrance
of this wood in pencils. Thousands of trees are cut every year to supply
pencil factories. With the scarcity of these trees, other woods are being
substituted. But who will be quite satisfied, or be persuaded that cedar
pencils are not the best?