Beautiful and stately, yet full of grace is the form of a big elm tree
against the grey sky of a cloudy winter day. The tall trunk is crowned
with many main branches, which spread into a widening funnel shape,
subdividing into numberless smaller branches, whose direction is outward
and downward. The numerous twigs have the droop of a weeping willow. The
tree top is wonderful when every limb is bare.
In summer the same tree is a great fountain of green leaves. The long,
leafy twigs of new wood are flung out to the wind, and the twinkling
blades dazzle the eyes like spray. This is the time that we love the elm
for its shade, and as an ornament to home grounds and parks. Roadside
elms are the favourite nesting trees of the Baltimore oriole, whose
hanging pocket of grasses and yarns swings at the end of a high outer
branch.
When winter is still in the air, and snow on the landscape, the dark
twigs of these bare elm trees change colour. It is the purple flower
clusters that are flung out from opening buds in late March. It takes
sharp eyes to see the cause of the wine-coloured flush in the tree top.
With the opening of the leafy shoots in April, the trees get an added
colour from the pale green seed discs that replace the flowers. These are
winged, and they soon turn brown, and fly away on the first breeze. This
is the elm’s way of sowing seeds. A crop of young elms grows each summer
in fields and gardens near these seed trees. The leaf of the seedling is
exactly after the pattern of the parental tree, but smaller.
The English elm is less graceful than our American tree. It has more the
stature of the white oak. The head is compact, and the foliage mass
thicker, and longer-lived. The robin red-breast nests close to the sturdy
trunk, shielded by the earliest leaves.
An old couplet guides the farmer in the old country:
“When the elm leaf is as big as a mouse’s ear,
Then to sow barley never fear.”
The toughness of elm is remembered by all who have “read of the wonderful
one-hoss shay.” Nothing but “ellum” was proper stuff for the hubs, you
know. As it is durable in soil, elm is good timber for posts and railroad
ties. By its toughness and flexibility, it is fit for waggon tongues, and
all kinds of agricultural implements. The ancient warrior of England was
likely to carry a longbow made of the tough British elm.
Slippery elms grow more irregular in form than the American, and are
usually smaller trees. Both kinds grow together in the wooded regions
east of the Rocky Mountains. The difference between them can be easily
detected by a blind person. Twigs, buds, and leaves of slippery elms are
made rough and harsh to the touch by coarse, reddish hairs.
Boys and many other people like the taste of the glutinous inner bark of
this tree when the sap is running, and the limbs and trunks peel easily.
Many a tree is sacrificed to this appetite. The same delectable
mucilaginous substance quenches the thirst and allays hunger,—so hunters
say, who have eaten it when lost in the woods, and threatened with
starvation. Poultices of it relieve throat troubles, when there is
congestion. It is a home remedy for inflammations and fevers. Dried and
ground, the rich cambium is mixed with milk, and forms a nutritious and
tasty food for invalids. It is a staple on the shelves of apothecary
shops.
The rock elm might be mistaken for a bur oak were the leaves not decided
proof that it is an elm. The limbs are shaggy, and the twigs winged by
the corky bark. Indeed, another name for the tree is the cork elm. The
framework of this tree is stiff and irregular, a decided contrast to the
graceful drooping top of the American elm, whose symmetry is one of its
best points.
The wood has its fibres so interlaced that no wood excels it in toughness
and springiness. It is the wheelwright’s choice. It makes the finest
bridge timbers, and the best axe handles, and wheel hubs.
The winged elm is the smallest and daintiest of the elms. The twigs are
broadened by a corky ridge on each side. This gives the tree its name.
The Indian name, Wahoo, is also heard in the South. The leaves are of the
elm type, but unusually small.
It is seen as a street and lawn tree in cities and towns south of
Virginia, and west to Illinois and Texas.