The Juniper is an historical tree, and has been the subject of many
interesting traditions,—supposed by the ancients to yield a shade that
was injurious to human life; the emblem of faith, because its heart is
always sound; the bearer of fruit regarded as a panacea for all
diseases, and a magic charm which was thrown on the funeral pile to
protect the spirit of the dead from evil, and bound with the leaves to
propitiate the deities by their incense. It is not improbable that the
superstitious notions respecting the power of its fruit to heal diseases
gave origin to the use of it in the manufacture of certain alcoholic
liquors; and it is a remarkable fact that universal belief in its
virtues as a panacea should have attached to a plant which is now used
for no important medical purpose whatever save the flavoring of gin!
The Juniper, very generally called the Red Cedar, and known in many
places as the Savin, is well known to all our people, and is associated
with the most rugged scenery of our coast. On all our rocky hills which
have been stripped of their original growth the Juniper springs up as if
it found there a soil congenial to its wants. On the contrary, the soil
is very poorly adapted to it, for the tree never attains a good size in
these situations. Its presence there may be attributed to the birds that
feed in winter upon its fruit, and scatter its seeds while in quest of
dormant insects among the sods. As we journey southward, we find this
tree in perfection in New Jersey and Maryland; and in all the Atlantic
States south of Long Island Sound the Junipers are large and thrifty
trees.
On our barren hills, near the coast, where they are so common as to be
the most conspicuous feature of certain regions, they display a great
variety of shapes and grotesque peculiarities of outline. Yet the normal
shape of this tree is a perfect spire. When it presents this form, it
is, in the true sense of the word, a beautiful object. Even its
rusty-green foliage gives variety to the hues of the landscape, and
heightens by contrast the verdure of other trees. This effect is the
more remarkable at midsummer, when the green of the different trees has
become nearly uniform in its shades. At this time the mixture of the
duller tints of the Juniper is very agreeable.
The Juniper is very full of branches, irregularly disposed at a small
angle with the trunk, forming an exceedingly dense mass of foliage. A
singular habit of this tree is that of producing tufts of branches with
foliage resembling that of the prostrate Juniper, as if a branch of that
shrub had been ingrafted upon it. The berries, which are abundant in the
fertile trees, are of a light bluish color, and afford a winter repast
to many species of birds, particularly the waxwing. The branches, when
their extremities are brought into contact with the soil, readily take
root. Hence we sometimes find a clump of small trees gathered like
children around the parent tree.
The trunk of this tree diminishes so rapidly in size as to lose its
value for many purposes to which the wood is adapted; but this rapid
diminution in diameter is one of its picturesque properties, and the
cause in part of that spiry form which is so much admired in this tree.
The lateral branches, always inserted obliquely, diminish in size
proportionally with the decrease of the trunk. The Juniper is first
discovered on Cedar Island in Lake Champlain, and, south of this
latitude, extends all along the coast to the Cape of Florida, and along
the shores of the Gulf of Mexico.