374 VARIOUS PLANT GROUPS 
two coalescent and adherent bractlets. Plants with both 
staminate and pistillate inflorescences borne upon the same 
individual plant are termed monecious.! 
The united bracts and bractlets of birches (Betula) ripen 
into dry scales forming a cone-like cluster of fruits made up 
of little samaras. In hazels the involucre becomes much 
enlarged in fruit, and each surrounds a much hardened peri- 
carp which because of its hardness and indehiscence is called 
a nut.? 
The family comprises woody plants without oil reservoirs 
but with resinous warts or hairs on the younger parts; simple, 
stipulate leaves; and monecious inflorescences, the staminate 
amentaceous, the pistillate in spikes or heads with coalescent 
bracts and bractlets, and the pistils of two carpels with azxile 
placente. 
123. The beech family (Fagacez). Examples: chest- 
nut (Figs. 24-26, pages 37, 38), oaks (Figs. 242, 248, 267, 
pages 257, 258, 277), and beech (Fig. 257, page 268). 
See pages 414, 415 for the formulas of Fagus, Castanea, Quercus, 
and Fagacez. 
The inflorescences of this family resemble those of the 
preceding family in being moneecious and in part amenta- 
ceous. It is in the bracts and the way they are borne that 
we find the most significant differences—differences which 
become more striking as the fruit matures. Indeed, bot- 
anists have here met with a morphological problem of more 
than ordinary difficulty in the preliminary question: What 
are the homologues of bracts which ripen with a beechnut, 
a chestnut-bur, or an acorn? 
In the staminate inflorescences of beech (Fagus) and chest- 
nut (Castanea) the bracts are obvious enough and are suffi- 
ciently like those of the birch family to require no special 
1 Mo-ne’cious < Gr. monos, one; oikos, household. This is indi- 
cated by @-@Q. If the staminate inflorescence differs in form from 
the pistillate the nature of each is shown by placing the inflorescence 
signs in corresponding order, 2. e., beginning with the staminate. Thus 
Iii would read ‘“staminate inflorescence amentaceous, the pistillate 
spicate, both compounded of heads.” 
2In the formula this extra hardness of the pericarp is indicated by 
two inverted exclamation points. 
