THE ELMS AND THE HACKBERRY
Family Ulmaceæ
The members of this family are found in Europe, Asia, and North
America. Two genera, the elm (_Ulmus_) and the hackberry (_Celtis_),
are found in the Northeastern States.
The elms are remarkable for the massive strength of their trunk and
limbs and for the light delicacy of their small branches and twigs as
we see them against the sky in winter. The American and English elms
particularly are really more beautiful in winter than in summer, when
the contrast between the little twigs and the little branches is hidden
by the leaves. The elms are all long-lived trees and grow rapidly. They
bear transplanting and pruning better than any other tree, and grow on
almost any kind of soil. If it were not for the attacks of insects, to
which the elms seem peculiarly liable, no trees would be more deserving
of cultivation. Perhaps no other tree is so strongly associated in
our minds with the beautiful old valley towns and hillside villages
of New England, and to the elms they largely owe their beauty. Three
indigenous elms are found in the Northeastern States, the American,
slippery, and cork elms, and two from Europe, the English and the
Scotch or Dutch elms, are planted commonly in our gardens and parks.
[Sidenote: American or White Elm
_Ulmus americana_]
_A large spreading tree, with graceful, drooping branches. Smooth brown
twigs; alternate leaf-scars. The terminal and lateral buds are the same
size; the flower buds are larger. The flowers come before the leaves in
the early spring, and the fruit, a small round samara, ripens later in
the spring._
The American elm stands absolutely alone among trees for its especial
kind of beauty. No other tree combines such strength and lofty
stateliness with so much fine work and delicacy. Its trunk divides a
short distance from the ground into many large, spreading branches,
which stretch up high into the air and support the waving, drooping,
curving twigs and small branches.
[Illustration: AMERICAN ELM, LANCASTER, MASS.
_Ulmus americana_
(From a photograph by Mr. Eli Forbes)
Page 102
]
It is interesting to find how many distinct shapes the American elm
takes. These are so varied that many people think that each form is
a separate species, but they are all different types of the same tree.
The Etruscan vase is one of the most familiar shapes of this elm. Its
trunk divides a short way from the ground into several equally large
branches, and the top of the tree is flat, with down-sweeping lateral
branches. The beautiful Lancaster elm, from which the accompanying
photograph was taken, belongs to this Etruscan vase form. Another
well-known shape is the plume, which may be either single or compound.
In these trees the single trunk or two or three parallel limbs rise to
a great height without branches, and these spread into one or two light
waving plumes. Many of these plume elms are found in the Berkshire
Hills and throughout New England where the woods have been cut away and
the elms have been left standing. The oak form, still another shape
the elm occasionally takes, is broad and round-headed, with heavy
lateral branches which extend in a horizontal direction in a manner
very suggestive of the white oak. This is not so common as the vase
and plume elms, and only occurs when the tree has grown in an open
situation with plenty of air and light. A fine specimen of this tree
stands near the Pratt house, in Concord, Massachusetts. “Feathered”
elms are those which have a growth of little twigs along the trunk
and branches. They may feather any of the different forms already
described, and they come from latent buds which may have been dormant
for years before opening.
“The white elm,” Professor Charles S. Sargent says, “is one of the
largest and most graceful trees of the Northeastern States and
Canada. It is beautiful at all seasons of the year,—when its minute
flowers, harbingers of earliest spring, cover the branches; when in
summer it rises like a great fountain of dark and brilliant green
above its humbler companions of the forest or sweeps with long and
graceful boughs the placid waters of some stream flowing through
verdant meadows; when autumn delicately tints its leaves; and when
winter brings out every detail of the great arching limbs and slender
pendulous branches standing out in clear relief against the sky.
“The elm trees which greeted the English colonists as they landed on
the shores of New England seemed like old friends from their general
resemblance to the elm trees that had stood by their cottages at home;
and as the forest gave way to cornfields many elm trees were allowed
to escape the axe, and when a home was made a sapling elm taken from
the borders of a neighboring swamp was often set to guard the rooftree.
These elm trees, remnants of the forest which covered New England
when it was first inhabited by white men, or planted during the first
century of their occupation, are now dead or rapidly disappearing;
they long remained the noblest and most imposing trees of the Northern
States, and no others planted by man in North America have equalled the
largest of them in beauty and size.”
The wood is heavy, tough, and difficult to split. It is used for making
the hubs of wheels and for flooring, cooperage, and boat-building.
The generic name, _Ulmus_, comes from ulm or elm, the Saxon name of
the tree, the specific name explains itself. The American elm is found
from Newfoundland to Florida and as far west as the eastern base of the
Rocky Mountains.
[Sidenote: Slippery or Red Elm
_Ulmus pubescens_]
_A medium-sized tree, 45 to 60 feet high. The twigs are gray and
bristled, unlike the smooth twigs of the white elm. Alternate
leaf-scars, which are more conspicuous than those of the white elm. The
buds are larger and rounder than those of the white elm; they are soft
and downy, and are covered with reddish brown hairs. The inner bark is
very mucilaginous._
Country boys know the slippery elm for its sweet mucilage, just as they
know the shagbark for its nuts, the sassafras for its aromatic roots,
and the spruce for its gum; and this mucilaginous characteristic is a
certain means of determining the tree.
In form it is less drooping than the white elm and it is also much
smaller. The hairy buds give the whole tree a reddish color in spring,
and from this it probably takes the name of red elm; the slippery
elm is a more characteristic name however, as few trees have such a
slippery inner bark. These hairy brown buds are among the prettiest to
be found on any trees in winter. Compared with the smooth, hard buds
on many trees, they are what soft, long-haired Angoras are to ordinary
cats.
The wood is strong, hard, and close-grained and is used for making
posts, railroad ties, and agricultural implements. The inner bark is
used for inflammatory diseases and externally for poultices.
The specific name, _pubescens_ (down or soft hair), refers to the
pubescence on the buds and leaves and along the recent shoots.
[Illustration: YOUNG CORK ELM
_Ulmus racemosa_
Page 107
]
The slippery elm is found in certain localities throughout the
Atlantic States, it is not common in Eastern Massachusetts.
[Sidenote: Cork or Rock Elm
_Ulmus racemosa_]
_A large tree, 80 to 100 feet high, known by the peculiar corky ridges
along the branches. Alternate leaf-scars. The recent twigs and the
scales of the bud are fringed with downy hair._
In New England the cork elm is found in the northwestern part of New
Hampshire and in Southern Vermont. It is rare in Massachusetts, and
would probably be found only in the western part of the State growing
wild. Neither Michaux nor Emerson has described the cork elm. Nuttall
says that it was discovered in the State of New York by a Mr. Thomas,
and he gives the tree the name “Thomas’s elm,” which has fortunately
not been retained.
The wood is tougher and of somewhat finer grain than that of the white
elm, and in the “Silva of North America,” Professor Sargent says: “The
value of the wood of the rock elm threatens its extinction; and most
of the large trees have already been cut in the forests of Canada, New
England, New York, and Michigan. The rock elm is sometimes planted as
a shade tree in the region which it inhabits naturally, and although
it grows rather more slowly than the white elm, it is a handsome and
distinct ornamental tree which planters have too generally neglected.”
The specific name, _racemosa_ (cluster-flowered), refers to the flowers
which grow in a raceme.
It is found in New England, its range extending southward and westward.
[Sidenote: English Elm
_Ulmus campestris_]
_A tall tree, more upright in growth than the American elm. The
branches are less spreading and more erect than those of the American
species. In this climate it is often distinguished by the little tufts
of dead twigs on the tree. The bark is darker and coarser than that of
the American elm; the buds and twigs differ very little from those of
our species._
[Illustration: ENGLISH ELMS
_Ulmus campestris_
Page 108
]
The English elm is found planted frequently throughout New England,
and there are many fine specimens in Massachusetts, especially in
the country about Boston. According to Emerson, they were originally
said to be imported and planted by a wheelwright for his own use in
making the hubs of wheels, for which purpose the wood of the English
elm is superior to any other. At all events, there are many beautiful
specimens growing near old colonial houses, and sometimes they are
found growing by stone walls at some distance from the house, back of
farm buildings and barns, as was the group from which I took the
following photograph.
The American elm is more graceful than the English elm, which, on
the other hand, is more stately; both trees are unusually beautiful,
although representing such different types of beauty. In the “Autocrat
of the Breakfast-Table,” Dr. Holmes contrasts the English and American
elms growing on Boston Common. “Go out with me into that walk which we
call the Mall,” he says, “and look at the English and American elms.
The American elm is tall, graceful, slender-sprayed, and drooping as if
from languor. The English elm is compact, robust, holds its branches
up, and carries its leaves for weeks longer than our own native tree.
Is this typical of the creative force on the two sides of the ocean or
not?”
In England the elm has been planted from the time of the Romans, though
Dr. Walker thinks that it was brought over at the time of the Crusades.
The elm was planted by the Romans as a prop for grape vines, and in the
South of Italy it is still used for that purpose. In “Paradise Lost”
Milton refers to this when he describes how Adam and Eve spent their
time in the Garden of Eden. Among various other occupations,
“They led the vine
To wed her elm; she spoused about him twines
Her marriageable arms; and with her brings
Her dower, the adopted clusters to adorn
His barren leaves.”
Columella tells us that vineyards with elm trees as props were named
_arbusta_, the vines themselves being called _arbustivæ vitæ_, to
distinguish them from others raised in more confined situations. Once
in two years the elms were carefully pruned to prevent their leaves
from overshadowing the grapes; this was considered of great importance,
and we have a better understanding of Virgil’s reproach to Corydon, who
neglected both his elms and vines, when we realize this:—
“Semiputate tibi frondosa vitis in ulmo est.”
(Your vine half pruned upon the leafy elm.)
In Ovid, Vertumnus alludes to the mutual dependence of the elm and the
vine when he assures Pomona of the advantages of a happy marriage:—
“‘If that fair elm,’ he cried, ‘alone should stand
No grapes would glow with gold, and tempt the hand;
Or if that vine without her elm should grow,
’T would creep a poor neglected shrub, below.’”
The specific name, _campestris_, comes from the Latin word meaning
belonging to a plain or field.
[Illustration: SCOTCH ELM
_Ulmus montana_
Page 111
]
[Sidenote: Scotch, Dutch, or Wych Elm
_Ulmus montana_]
_A medium-sized tree, 50 to 60 feet high. The bark is smooth and green.
The branches are spreading and somewhat drooping. The buds are not
downy like those of the slippery elm._
The Scotch elm, like the English elm, is extensively cultivated in the
parks and gardens about Boston, and it is frequently planted along
roadsides. It is less upright and tall than the English elm, its
average height being about forty feet, and it has a more spreading head.
The Scotch elm, according to Gerard, had various uses in ancient
times. Its wood was made into bows, and its bark, which is so tough
that it will strip or peel off from the wood from one end of a bough
to the other without breaking, was made into ropes. Its wood was
not considered so good for naves as that of the English elm, though
in Scotland it is used by ship-builders, the block and pump maker,
the cartwright and cabinet maker. Loudon says in his “Arboretum et
Fruticetum Britannicum”: “In many parts of the country, the wych elm,
or witch-hazel, as it is still occasionally called, is considered a
preservative against witches; probably from the coincidence, between
the words ‘wych’ and ‘witch.’ In some of the midland counties, even to
the present day, a little cavity is made in the churn to receive a
small portion of witch-hazel, without which the dairymaids imagine that
they would not be able to get the butter to come.”
The specific name, _montana_, from the Latin word meaning living on
mountains, was given to this tree because it is found growing, not only
in the plains and valleys, like _Ulmus campestris_, but also in the
remote highlands where it finds a foothold and flourishes on the steep
slopes of the mountains.
[Sidenote: Hackberry, Sugarberry, Nettle Tree
_Celtis occidentalis_]
_A small tree, 20 to 50 feet high, with slender, wide-spreading
branches. The terminal buds are lacking, the lateral ones are flattened
and pointed and somewhat hairy. The twigs are dark grayish brown with
white chambered pith inside the stems. The leaf-scars are semi-oval
with three bundle-scars and alternate in arrangement. The fruit is
reddish, turning dark purple; it is round and berry-like and about the
size of a currant._
[Sidenote: HACKBERRY
_Celtis occidentalis_
Page 112
]
The hackberry grows wild in Massachusetts, but it is found rarely and
is generally mistaken for an elm. It grows commonly in lowland woods
in Western New York and the Middle States, and it can be identified
both in winter and summer by the white chambered pith, which is
found by cutting a stem of recent growth. The dried fruit, which hangs
on the stems through the winter, is also another means of recognizing
the tree,—this berry-like fruit can be seen in the photograph which
I took as late in the deciduous season as April thirteenth. It is a
round-headed tree with a short trunk and usually a broad spread of
branches, but in the basin of the Ohio River it grows to be a tall and
stately tree.
The wood is heavy and coarsely grained, and is used for fences and for
making cheap furniture.
The generic name, _Celtis_, is the ancient Greek name for the lotus
berry; and the specific name, _occidentalis_ (belonging to the west),
designates its American origin.