Larch Tree.
Larix.
Also see: Fir Tree - Red Fir Tree, or Pitch Tree - Larch Tree - Pitch Tree - The Wild Pine Tree - The Turpentine Tree.
A moderately tall, and in summer a very beautiful tree; but though one of the resinous kind, and in many respects approaching to the nature of the fir and pine, it loses its leaves in winter: it is a native of Italy, and is frequent in our gardens. The trunk is rugged, and the branches are covered with a rough bark, of a brownish colour, with a tinge of reddish. The leaves are an inch or more in length, extremely slender, and of a bluish green colour, and they grow in little clusters, on different parts of the branches. The flowers are inconsiderable, the fruit is a cone, but very small. It is not bigger than a little walnut.
The young leaves are boiled, and the liquor is drank to promote urine, but this is an idle way of getting at the virtues of the tree. Venice turpentiue is produced from it, and this liquid resin contains them all in perfection. They cut the trunk of the tree deep, in the heat of summer, and the resin flows out. This works powerfully by urine, and is a noble balsam; it is good against the whites, and to stop the running that often remains, from a clap after all the virulence is removed; but in this case it must be given cautiously.
