1410 ARBORETUM AND FRUTICETUM. PART III. 
leaves borne on a shoot that is developed in the same year with themselves. 
Petiole of leaf not obvious; disk of leaf elliptical, unequal at the base, 
dentate. Indigenous to the west of Asia, and upon the shores of the Caspian 
Sea; and to Imiretta and Georgia, on the south of Mount Caucasus. (V. Du 
Ham.) Introduced in 1760; flowering in April or May; and growing to 
the height of from 50 ft. to 70 ft. 
Description, §c. The zelkoua, in its native country, according to Michaux, 
is a tree of the largest size, growing to the height of from 75 ft. to 80 ft., with 
a trunk of the diameter of about 4 ft. The trunk is straight and upright, often 
attaining the height of 25 ft. or 30 ft. before it 
throws out a single branch. The base of the 
trunk is not enlarged, like that of most other 
trees, its thickness being very little greater at 
the surface of the ground than it is at the point 
of ramification. Like that of the hornbeam, it 
is marked with longitudinal furrows, like open 
gutters. The head is large, tufted, and very 
much branched; but the branches, though 
widely extended, are more slender, and more 
vertical in their direction, than is generally the 
case with forest trees. The bark of the trunk is 
not grey and cracked, like that of the elm or 
the oak, but resembles rather that of the horn- 
beam or beech. As is the case with those trees, 
the surface of the bark of the zelkoua is smooth, 
and its texture is firm and compact; but it has 
this remarkable difference, that, when the tree 
becomes about 8 in. in diameter, it scales off 
in large thin pieces. The flowers are small, of 
a greenish brown, and smell like those of the elder ; and they are disposed in 
groups along the shoots of the current year. The fruit is not larger than a 
pea; and the seeds, which are contained in little gibbous capsules, having two 
cells, are about the size of a grain of hemp-seed. In Imiretta (a pastoral 
district lying between Georgia aud the shores of the Black Sea), where the 
zelkoua is found in the greatest abundance, the seeds ripen in the month of 
October; but in France they always drop off before they have completed 
their maturity. This is the more remarkable, from the tree having been 
introduced into France above seventy years ago, and there being at Versailles 
a tree above fifty years old, in a most vigorous state of growth, which has 
resisted the most severe frosts. The foliage strongly resembles that of the 
elm in its general appearance. The leaves are borne on very short petioles, 
and are generally from lin. to 3in.long. They are alternate, and equally 
dentated, or rather crenulated; differing, in this respect, from those of every 
kind of elm known; the leaves of the elm always having every large indentation 
accompanied by a smaller one. The leaves of the zelkoua are, also, of a much 
firmer and drier texture than those of the elm; and, it is said, are not, like those 
of the latter tree, liable to the attacks of insects. When the first tree of this 
species planted in France was cut down, in 1820, it was found to be 70 ft. 
in height, and its trunk to be 7 ft. in cireumference at 5 ft. from the ground. 
The bole of the trunk was 20 ft. in length, and of nearly uniform thickness ; 
and the proportion of heart-wood to the sap-wood was about three quarters 
of its diameter. This tree was about fifty years old, but was still in a growing 
state, and in vigorous health. (See Michaux’s Mémoire sur le Zelkoua, Paris, 
1831.) Descemet, in his Tableau Historique des Progrés de la Culture des Arbres 
a Odessa, &c., describes this speciesas a “lofty and beautiful tree, a nativeof 
Mingrelia and Caucasus, which is distinguished by its shining green, broadly 
crenulated leaves, and its smooth and greenish trunk.” (p. 60.) In British 
gardens, the rate of growth of this tree is similar to that of the beech or 
common hornbeam ; it attaining the height of 20 ft.in 10 years. 
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