attractive appearance. The trunks are sharply buttressed and deeply creased. Sometimes the folds of bark within the creases almost reach the center of the tree. The sapwood is thin, the heartwood irregular in color. Some is darker than the heartwood of southern red cedar, other is clouded and mottled, pale yellow, cream-colored, the shade of slate, or streaked with various tints. The wood can be economically worked only as small pieces. It takes a soft and pleasing finish. It is a lathe wood and shows to best advantage as balusters, ornaments, grill spindles and small posts, Indian clubs, dumb-bells, balls, and lodge gavels. It has been made into small game boards with fine effect, and it is an excellent material for small picture frames. Furniture makers put it to use in several ways, and it has been recommended for small musical instruments where the variegated colors can be displayed to excellent advantage. At the best it can never be more than a minor species, because it is difficult of access in the remote deserts, and it is not abundant. MOUNTAIN JUNIPER (_Juniperus sabinoides_) is a Texas tree, occupying a range southward and westward of the Colorado river. It has several local names, rock cedar being a favorite. This name is due to the tree’s habit of growing on rocky ridges and among ledges where soil is scarce. It is called juniper cedar, and juniper. Under the most favorable circumstances the tree may attain a height of 100 feet and a diameter of two, but it nearly always grows where conditions are adverse, and its size and form change to conform to circumstances. It is often small and ragged. Its lead-colored bark is apt to attract attention on account of its woeful appearance, hanging in strings and tatters which persistently cling to the trunk in spite of whipping winds. When the tree is cut for fuel, or for any other purpose, the ragged bark is occasionally pulled off and is tied in bales or bundles to be sold for kindling. When the mountain juniper is taken from its native wilds and planted where environments are different, it sometimes assumes fantastic forms. It has been planted for ornament on the low, flat coast in the vicinity of the Gulf of Mexico, and though it lives and grows, it often takes on a peculiar appearance. The trunks resemble twisted and interwoven bundles of lead-colored vines, buttressed, fluted, and gnarled. The branches lose their upright position, and hang in careless abandon, with drooping festoons. In winter the wind whips most of the foliage from them. The leaves become brittle and may be easily brushed from the twigs by a stroke of the hand. Some of the planted trees have trunks so deeply creased as to be divided in two separate stems. This very nearly happens with some of the wild trees among the western mountains.