293

[7—156.]
Tenth Census
of the
United States.
Tree Covering; Forest Wealth;
the Lumbering Industry.
Chas. S. Sargent,
Expert and Special Agt.

Department of the Interior,
Census Office,
Brookline, Mass., August 19th 1881.

My dear Professor Bessey.

Can you tell me any thing about this
famous diamond willow in regard to
which some of my western correspondents seem
to be more or less [mean?]? The foliage
they send [?] belongs to S. Cordata: what
I have always looked upon as a shrub rather
than a tree. In Nebraska, however, they speak
of this particular plant as a good sized tree,
the red wood of which is as durable and
as valuable for fence posts as a Red Cedar.

Can this be true? I should be glad to know
for [?] [?] something [?] in regard
to the matter. Can you [?] me & so
greatly oblige.

Yours faithfully,
C. S. Sargent