Aurantiaca, both in habit and characters. Mr. Nuttall has overlooked the stipules, which are certainly
present in M. Aurantiaca, although they are very small. This interesting tree was first introduced into the
Gardens at St. Louis, Mississippi, from a tree transplanted from the village of the Osage Indians, and from seeds
obtained from that tree, plants were raised in the nursery of Mr. M‘Mahon of Philadelphia, and thence introduced
to this country by Lord Bagot, from seeds received from the celebrated Naturalist, Mr. Correa de Serra,
then Ambassador of Portugal to the United States. The trees at Philadelphia have reached their full size!
and produce fruit annually. Lord Bagot possesses two fine trees of it, which he keeps in his conservatory.
Mr. Nuttall, who was very lately in this country, informed me, that it bears the winters of Philadelphia without
injury. It will consequently readily endure our winters in the open air, a circumstance that will render it a
still more valuable acquisition to the gardens of this country. Lord Bagot was so good as to give me plants
of it, which are now' growing at Boytou.
I subjoin the following extract relating to this tree from “ Mr. James’s interesting account o f the Expedition
to the Rocky Mountains.”
“ 11301111,3 Aurantiaca of Nuttall.— A description of this interesting tree may be seen in Mr. Nuttall’s
valuable work, on the Genera of North American Plants, page 233, vol. ii. That description was drawn from
specimens cultivated in the garden of Mr. Choteau, at St. Louis, where, as might be expected, the tree did
not attain its full size and perfect character. In its native wilds the Maclura is conspicuous by its showy
fruit, in size and external appearance resembling the largest oranges.
“ The leaves are of an oval form, with an undivided margin, and the upper surface of a smooth shining green;
they are five or six inches long, and from two to three wide. The wood is of a yellowish colour, uncommonly
tine and elastic, affording the material most used for bows by all the savages from the Mississippi to the
Rocky Mountains. How far towards the North its use extends, we have not been informed, but we have
often seen it among the lower tribes of the Missouri, who procure it in trade from the Osages, and the Pawnees
of Red River. The bark, fruit, &e. when wounded, discharges a copious milky sap, which soon dries on
exposure, and is insoluble in water, containing, probably, like the milky juices of many of the Urticecc, a large
intermixture of coatchouc or gum elastic. Observing this property in the milky juice of the fruit, we were
tempted to apply it to our skin, where it formed a thin and flexible varnish, affording us, as we thought, some
protection from the ticks.
“ The fruit consists of radiating, somewhat woody fibres, terminating in a tuberculated and slightly papillose
surface. In this fibrous mass, the seeds, which are nearly as large as those of a quince, are disseminated. We
cannot pretend to say what part of the fruit has been described, as the “ pulp which is nearly as succulent as
that of an orange, sweetish and perhaps agreeable when fully ripe.” In our opinion the whole of it is as disagreeable
to the taste, and as unfit to be eaten, as the fruit of the sycamore, to which it has almost as much
resemblance as to the orange.
“ The tree rises t0 the height of twenty-five or thirty feet, dividing near the ground into a number of long
slender, and flexuous branches. It inhabits deep and fertile soils along the river valley. The Arkansa appears to
be the northern limit of the range of the Maclura, and neither on that river nor on the Canadian, does the
tree, or the fruits, attain so considerable a size as in warmer latitudes. Of many specimens of the fruit
examined by Major Long, at the time of his visit to Red River, in 1817, several were found measuring five
and a half inches in diameter.”
The following is a Letter from Nr. Nuttall, dated Liverpool, April 12, 1824, containing much valuable
information relative to this tree.
“ I have herewith sent you, the drawings of the Maclura, and have but little to add concerning it besides
what is already before the public. I have, however, since that publication seen the male Jicmers with which I
had been unacquainted. They are produced in partly sessile clusters, probably twelve or more together in a
very short raceme, and consist each of a four-parted greenish calix including three but more commonly four
stamens about the length or a little exceeding that of the calix.
“ The trees often attain the height of 60-feet or upwards, having very spreading branches thickly clothed
with a foliage of the most vivid and shining green. The flowers are very inconspicuous and nearly green