56 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. SAPINDACE. 
and trom half an inch to an inch long, or more than twice the length of the pedicels. The petals 
are nearly equal in length and puberulous; the thin limb is about twice the length of the claw; in 
the lateral pair it is broadly ovate or oblong, and in the superior pair oblong-spatulate, much nar- 
rower, and sometimes marked with red stripes. There are usually seven stamens with long exserted 
curved pubescent filaments and orange-colored anthers bearing a few scattered hairs. The ovary is 
pubescent and covered with long slender deciduous prickles with thickened tubercle-like bases, which 
enlarge and roughen the surface of the fruit which is ovate or irregularly obovate, pale brown, and an 
inch to almost two inches long, with thin or sometimes thick valves, and is borne on stout stems half an 
inch to nearly an inch in length. The seed is an inch or an inch and a half broad. 
Aesculus glabra is confined to the valley of the Mississippi River. It is found on the western 
slopes of the Alleghany Mountains from Pennsylvania to northern Alabama, extending west to southern 
Towa, central Kansas, and the Indian Territory. The younger Michaux found the Fetid Buckeye 
growing in large numbers on the banks of the Ohio River between Pittsburgh and Marietta; but it is 
now nowhere abundant, and, although distributed over a wide extent of territory, is the least common of 
the American arborescent Horse-chestnuts. It is always found in rich moist soil in river-bottom lands 
or on the banks of streams. It is most common and reaches its greatest size in the valley of the Ten- 
nessee River in Tennessee and northern Alabama. 
The wood of Zsculus glabra is light, soft, close-grained, but not strong, and is often blemished 
by dark lines of decay. It is nearly white with darker colored thin sapwood, composed of ten or twelve 
layers of annual growth. The specific gravity of the absolutely dry wood is 0.4542, a cubic foot 
weighing 28.31 pounds. It is not distinguished commercially from the wood of sculus octandra, 
and, like this, is used in the manufacture of artificial limbs, for which the wood of Aisculus is preferred 
to that of all other American trees, wooden ware, wooden hats, and paper pulp. It is also occasionally 
sawed into lumber. 
An extract of the bark of sculus glabra has been found to act as an writant of the cerebro- 
spinal system.’ 
Afsculus glabra was not noticed by the early botanists who explored the valley of the Mississippi 
River, and Muehlenberg’”’ probably first distinguished its specific characters and sent it to the German 
botanist Willdenow, who first described it. 
Aisculus glabra was not introduced into English gardens until 1821.° It is the least desirable of 
It is perfectly hardy in New England, 
the American species as a garden plant, and is rarely cultivated. 
where it forms a small round-headed tree flowering at the end of May and ripening its fruit in October. 
1 Hale, New Remedies, 1877, 19. — Millspaugh, Am. Med. Pl. in 
Homeopathic Remedies, i. 44, t. 44. 
2 Gotthilf Heinrich Muehlenberg (1753-1815) ; a member of a 
distinguished Lutheran family of German origin, was born in New 
Providence, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, and received his 
early education in the common schools of Philadelphia, and after- 
wards at Halle, where he was sent to study literature, the sciences, 
and theology. He returned to America in 1770, and was appointed 
assistant pastor of the Lutheran Church in Philadelphia, and ten 
years later pastor at Lancaster, Pennsylvania, a position which he 
filled assiduously and faithfully during the remainder of his life. 
Muehlenberg was noted for his knowledge of botany, especially of 
the Grasses, and enjoyed the friendship and correspondence of the 
principal American and European botanists of his time. His most 
important works are the Index Flore Lancastriensis, published in 
1793 in the third volume of the Transactions of the American Philo- 
sophical Society ; Catalogus Plantarum Americe Septentrionalis ; and 
Descriptio uberior Graminum. Muehlenbergia, a genus of Grasses 
widely scattered in its many species over the surface of the earth, 
fitly associates his name with the family of plants that he studied 
so successfully. 
3 Nicholson, Dictionary of Gardening. 
