six feet high. It is found in the Highlands, and is not uncommon northward.
The Juniper, or Red Cedar, is common enough in many parts of the country. Besides this variety, which is a tree, there is another, a low shrub, trailing on the ground, found along the great lakes, and among our northern hills, and this more closely resembles the European Juniper, whose berries are used in gin.[1]
Among the trees of note in this part of the country are also several whose northern limits scarcely extend beyond this State, and which are rare with us, while we are familiar with their names through our friends farther south. The Liquid Amber, or Sweet-Gum, is rare in this State, though very common in New Jersey; and on the coast it even reaches Portsmouth, in New Hampshire.
The Persimmon grows on the Hudson as far as the Highlands, and in the extreme southern counties. It is rather a handsome tree, its leaves are large and glossy, and its fruit, as most of us are aware, is very good indeed, and figures often in fairy tales as the medlar.
The Magnolias of several kinds are occasionally met with. The small Laurel Magnolia, or Sweet Bay, is found as far north as New York, in swampy grounds. The Cucumber Magnolia grows in rich woods in the western part of our State; and there is one in this village, a good-sized tree, perhaps thirty feet high; it is doing very well here, though the Weeping Willow will not bear our climate. This tree, in favorable spots, attains a height of
- ↑ Sir Charles Lyell supposes the American white Cedar, or Cypress, so common on the Mohawk, to have been the food of the Mastodon, from an examination of the contents of the stomach of one of these animals.
