108 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



our executive board for its closed sessions, and another adjoining room was 

 given to the display of plants and flowers by James Toms, who decorated it 

 handsomely and made a display that added materially to the pleasures of the 

 convention. 



At half past seven o'clock on Monday evening, December 6th, President 

 Lyon called the convention together, and the proceedings were opened by 

 music under the charge of Prof. Alvan Wilsey. 



The address of welcome, very appropriate and cordial was given by Judge 

 Page, and responded to in a very happy vein by President Lyon. 



After listening to another piece of music, Prof. AV. J. Beal of the Agricul- 

 tural College, delivered an address, illustrated by a number of charts, on 



THE OAKS OF MICHIGAN AND THE WORLD. 



He remarked in opening that his essay was full of quotations. Instead of 

 avoiding them, he had made as many as he could, giving the exact words of 

 the authors. This kind of mosaic work of quotations had taken much more 

 time than would have been required to write an essay without quotations. 



The main authors consulted were Loudon, Emerson, Michaux, and A. J. 

 Downing. 



" The oak is distinguished from all other trees by its acorn, for which the 

 fruit of no other tree can be mistaken." The leaves are late in appearing, 

 just before or just with the flowers. The stipules fall away as the leaves ex- 

 pand the buds. The flowers are of two kinds, both on one plant. " The sterile 

 flowers are in long, slender drooping catkins, which are in clusters; the fertile 

 flowers in a bud-like, scaly cup." The sterile flowers contain the pollen for 

 fertilizing the embryo acorns, and fall away as soon as the pollen is shed. The 

 young acorn contains three cells, and each cell two ovules. But one ovule, 

 sometimes two in each acorn, usually develops into an embryo. Botanists met 

 Avith little difficulty in distinguishing the species of oaks till those of America 

 began to attract attention. "The American sorts vary so exceedingly in their 

 leaves at different seasons of the year, in different stages of their growth, and 

 in different localities, that it is next to impossible to fix on a specific character, 

 taken from them, which shall remain constant." This is in some cases, 

 doubtless, owing to hybrids or cross between two forms which are generally 

 quite distinct. 



Oaks are quite easily and naturally separated into two groups by the time 

 required for each to ripen its fruit. The white oak may be taken as the type 

 of the first group, and ripens its fruit in autumn of the first year; the red 

 oak as the type of the second group, and ripens its fruit in autumn of the 

 second year. The leaves of the first group in our species are destitute of 

 bristly points; some of those of the second group have bristly pointed teeth 

 on the margins of the leaves. The acorns of the first group are more or less 

 sweet to the taste; of the second group, bitter. The wood of the first group 

 is generally much the more durable, valuable, and fine grained. 



The nearest relatives of the oaks in our country, or with which most of us are 

 familiar, are chestnuts and beeches; the next nearest, the iron-woods, blue 

 beeches, and hazels; the next, the birches and alders. 



The above, with a few others, taken together, constitute what is termed a 

 family or natural order. 



So far as discovered in the whole world, there are about 400 species in the en- 

 tire family. There are 25 birches, 14 alders, 9 hazels, 1 ostryopsis, 'Z iron-woods, 



