506 PHARMACEUTICAL BOTANY 
FAGACE# OR BEECH FAMILY (CUPULIFER&).—Beeches, Chest- 
nuts, Oaks, the trees of this family, are found in the temperate 
forests of the eastern and western hemispheres and comprise 
about 368 species. North America has over 50 species of oaks; 
2 species of Chestnuts; 1 species of beech and 1 species of golden- 
leaved chestnut. The most important American oaks used for 
building, for furniture, for cooperage, for wagons, for tanning 
_. leather etc. are white oak, Quercus 
alba; chestnut oak, Q. prinus; black 
oak, Q. velutina; live oak, Q. vir- 
_ gimana; swamp white oak, Q. 
platanoides; cow oak, Q. Michauxii, 
and the two Pacific coast oaks, Q. 
__ chrysolepis and post oak, Q. garryana. 
_ The uses of the fast disappearing 
American Chestnut, Castanea 
dentata, are well known. The 
_ wood of the beech, Fagus grandi- 
@® folia, is used for chairs, tool 
-%® handles, plane stocks, shoe lasts 
and for fuel. The nuts (mast) 
_ _ § fatten hogs and feed wild animals 
Fic. 378.—Ulmus fulva, the Slippery and birds. The cork of commerce 
Elm. Flowering branch bearing bell- i : 
shaped flowers, leaf and leaf and fruit- Ss obtained from the bark of 
ing branch. The fruits are circular, Quercus Suber and Quer cus occiden- 
. single samaras. ‘The inner bark of this talts, plants indigenous to Spain 
tree is rich in mucilage. (Reproduced and France. 
from U.S. Dept. Agric. Miscell. Publ. 77.) 
‘ 
The above trees are all monce- 
cious, that is the staminate (male) and pistillate (female) flowers 
are distinct from each other, but borne on the same tree. Most 
of the species are trees, a few oaks are shrubs. The leaves are 
simple, netted-veined and alternate. A pair of deciduous stipules 
are found at the base of the leaf-stalk (petiole). The margins of 
the chestnut and beech leaves are sharply cut with large teeth. 
The leaves of the oaks divide the genus into two groups, viz.—the 
white oaks with rounded lobed leaves and annual acorn production, 
and the black oaks with sharp, bristle-tipped lobes and biennial 
acorn production. The male flowers are in dangling heads 
