100 THE HICKORY. 
fully veined and mottled, is susceptible of a very high 
polish. Some of our most beautiful articles of fur- 
niture are made from this wood, and it may be justly 
ranked among the most useful of our sylvan produc- 
tions. The black walnut occasionally, though seldom, 
attains a great size. The trunk of one grown on the 
south side of Lake Erie, was some years since ex- 
hibited in London, which was 12 feet in diameter, 
and was hollowed out and furnished as a sitting-room. 
The tree was said to have been 150 feet in height, with 
branches from 2 to 4 feet in diameter, and the bark 
1 foot in thickness. 
The Hickory, though nearly allied to the Walnut, 
possesses properties peculiarly its own; its wood is 
light-colored, tough, and elastic, which renders it 
very serviceable to the carriage and wagon builder; 
and the air of comfort which always surrounds the 
hearth where the crackling of a good hickory fire is 
heard, fully attests its usefulness as fuel. 
The Hickory, particularly the variety known as the 
Shellbark, is a noble and majestic tree, rising to the 
height of 70 or 80 feet, with a trunk sometimes 5 
feet in thickness at the base, and varying but little 
from the straight line almost to its summit, and fre- 
quently without a branch below the height of 40 feet. 
The gathering of the nuts of the walnut and hickory 
affords considerable merriment to the younger part 
of the farmer’s family, while many a city fire-side, 
cheered by the social gathering, has found a rich 
treat in the fruits of these noble trees. 
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