Maple
a name for trees of the genus Acer, order Aceraceæ or Sapindaceæ, peculiar to the N. and temperate parts of the globe. About 50 species are known, distributed through Europe, North America, and different parts of Asia. They are small or large trees, with a sweetish, rarely milky, sap, opposite deciduous, simple, usually lobed leaves, and axillary and terminal racemes or corymbs or small greenish flowers. The wood of the great maple (A. Pseudo-platanus) is valuable for various purposes, as for carving, turnery, musical instruments, wooden dishes, etc. Another well-known species is the Norway maple (A. plantanoides), often planted as an ornamental tree. The sugar or rock maple (A. saccharinum) is the most important American species. Some other American species are the white maple (A. dasycarpum), the red or swamp maple (A. rubrum), the striped maple or moose wood (A. pennsylvanicum), the mountain maple (A. spicatum), the vine maple (A. circinatum), and the large-leaved maple (Α. macrophyllum).
MAQUI (mak'wē) (Aristotelia Maqui), the only known species of the genus, which belongs to the natural order Tiliaceæ, and has been made the type of a proposed order. It is an evergreen or sub-evergreen shrub, of considerable size, a native of Chile. The wood is used for making musical instruments, and the tough bark for their strings.