APETAL/ IOI 
certain types of soil derived from chalk or oolite, it 
_is therefore not so general in its distribution as our 
other forest trees. 
In Derbyshire it grows at an altitude of 1200 ft., 
and is planted in Scotland and Ireland. 
The Chalk Downs of the South of England, the 
Oolite district of the Cotswolds, the Chilterns, are 
typical districts for the Beech. It forms woods and 
forests. It also grows on limestone. In many other 
parts of the country it is planted, and fine avenues 
of Beech are to be encountered along the highways 
or in parks and private grounds. 
The habit is characteristic, with a straight trunk 
and usually two diverging main branches, from which 
are given off numerous smaller ones, which hang 
down mere or less vertically. The leaves are ovate, 
dentate, the midrib well marked, the veins oblique 
and parallel, glabrous, with a ciliate margin, and in 
spring softly downy. 
The flowers are apetalous: the male flowers 
pendulous in a head; the female borne on short 
peduncles. The fruit is triquetrous, smooth, and 
enclosed in a rough cupule, which is 4-cleft. 
The Beech, when full grown, is as much as 70 ft. 
high. It is in flower in April and May. 
The flowers are not regular in their appearance. 
The male flowers hang down in pendulous cymes, 
the females in pairs. The cupule contains two nuts, 
the mast. The stamens are eight to forty in the 
male flowers, and are exserted. The filaments are 
