THE LARGE LEAVED CUCUMBER TREE.
M. macrophylla, Michx.
The large-leaved cucumber tree exceeds all other magno lias in the size of its leaves and flowers. In fact, no tree out side the tropics can match it, for its blades are almost a yard in length. The flowers are great white bowls, sometimes a foot across, made of six white waxy petals, much broader than the three protecting sepals outside. The inner petals have purple spots at the base. The fruits are almost globular, two to three inches long, turning red as they mature, equally showy when the scarlet seeds dangle from the open follicles.
These trees are at home in fertile valleys among the foot hills of the Alleghanies, from North Carolina to middle Florida, and west to central Arkansas. Their range is not continuous. They occur in scattered groups that have
come from seed.
The horticulturist has greatly aided nature in the spread of this tree in this country and in Europe, where its flowers staid leaves attract universal attention. The mistake usually made is to plant it in the middle of a lawn where the wind lashes the broad leaves into ribbons before they have reached their full size. Every twig or leaf that touches a petal mars it with a brown bruise. The only way to enjoy one of these remarkable trees is to plant it in the most sheltered situation, where the sunshine will reach it and the breezes will not. Then the silver-lined foliage and the superb white blossoms can come to perfection and the sight is worth going miles to see.