198 WOODY PLANTS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



than that of the other hickories, and hardly less in size. It is 

 sessile on a short terminal stalk, and most commonly pear- 

 shaped ; at least, that is the shape which I have found most 

 common in Massachusetts, and that almost universally con- 

 nected with a leaf of five leaflets. This has been called the 

 jig-shaped, (jiciformis), from its resemblance to a fresh fig. 

 Another variety, also common, has the fruit nearly round, but 

 often irregularly shaped ; and a third, less common, has a large 

 broad fruit. These differences in the shape of the fruit are con- 

 nected with corresponding differences in the leaves, bark and 

 appearance of the tree, inducing several botanists to consider 

 them as distinct species. Michaux is probably right in making 

 them only varieties. The husk has a smooth or granular sur- 

 face, with seams depressed above and often prominent below, 

 and sometimes so from top to bottom, extending nearly to the 

 base, and dividing it into four unequal lobes. It is very thin, 

 though not equally so in all the varieties, and crustaceous, but 

 not hard. The nut has a hard and tough shell, sometimes thin 

 but oftener pretty thick, of a bluish gray color and smooth 

 surface. The kernel has at first a hazel-nut taste, which turns 

 presently to a disagreeable bitter. Some varieties have a nut 

 almost equal to an inferior shellbark. The nuts grow single, 

 or two, three, or four together. They are often very abundant, 

 several bushels being produced on a single tree, and they are 

 then usually found growing in pairs. 



The wood of the pignut hickory, varying greatly in the dif- 

 ferent varieties, has, in some, the excellent properties of this 

 class of trees in greater perfection than either of the other spe- 

 cies. It is therefore preferred for the axle-trees of carts, the 

 heads of mallets and beetles, and the handles of axes. A beetle 

 made of it, and used to drive stakes and iron wedges, outlasts, 

 I am told, any that can be made of any other wood, foreign or 

 native. As fuel, it is next to the species already described, and 

 superior to all other woods. 



This hickory grows to a great size, being sometimes three or 

 four feet in diameter, and rises to the height of seventy or eighty 

 feet, with a trunk very gradually tapering, and pretty large 

 limbs. 



