The redness of this maple is so marked that it cannot escape notice. The flowers, fruit, twigs, and leaves all possess the property at one time or another during the season. The flower comes before the leaf, during the first warm days of spring. That is pretty early in the South, and later in the North. The flowers are bright scarlet, and very conspicuous, growing in umbel-like, drooping clusters. The staminate and pistillate ones frequently grow on different trees, and always in separate clusters. The fruit ripens quickly, and is sometimes almost mature before the leaves appear. The date of ripening depends upon latitude. The tree’s range north and south exceeds a thousand miles and that makes much difference in climate. In the South the fruit outstrips the leaves and has about reached maturity before the unfolding leaves are large enough to hide it; but in New England and New York the leaves are large before the fruit is mature. The seed is the characteristic maple key, with a wing to carry it. The fruit--and by that term the seed with its attached wing is meant--is bright red, and a tree loaded with the vivid clusters is a beautiful spectacle. Two seeds are generally fast together, and they make surprising flights in that condition, passing with whirling motion through the air. Gravity spins them, but wind carries them forward, and the random of their flight depends on the strength of the wind, which happens to be blowing when they sever their connection with the tree. The seeds germinate quickly when they light on damp soil. If they do not find such situations, they soon perish; because they do not retain their vitality long. By the middle of summer the young trees have several leaves, and from that time on the struggle is mainly among themselves for space and moisture, because they stand so thick that it is a survival of the fittest. The young twigs are generally red in spring, but they do not present as conspicuous a mass as the flowers and fruit do. The leaves are simple, with long reddish petioles. They have three or five lobes, the lower pair often entirely missing, and small if present. Each lobe has a pointed apex, and is irregularly serrate. The base of the leaf is rounded; also the sinuses, which extend far into the body of the leaf. The upper surface of the leaf is bright green, the lower a silvery-white. In the fall this tree is entitled to the name scarlet; for then the brilliant hues of the leaves are remarkably fine.