80 NEW SYLYA 



FAGUS and CASTANEA. 



The Beech and Chesnut trees so unlike and 

 easily known by their fruits had been kept sep- 

 arate by the old Botanists, but Linneus took the 

 fancy to unite them under his Fagus. — ^This 

 linnean blunder was never assented to by the 

 French Botanists, and now after 100 years the 

 two genera are again acknowledged. But as 

 to our American Sp. they are yet miscalled and 

 deemed the same as the European ; which is 

 erroneous, none of our trees being quite identic! 

 I must therefore revise them and add some 

 new kinds. 



688. Fagus alba Raf. sylvatica of Amer. 

 hot. not L. nor Europe. Bark smooth white, 

 branchlets terete cinereous, leaves on short pe- 

 tiols ovate lanceol. dentate ciliate, acute at 

 both ends, green concolor, aments on short pe- 

 duncles, nuts ovate mucronate obtusely trigone 

 — Our white Beech tree, common all over N. 

 America, 50 to 60 feet high, leaves 2 or 3 in- 

 ches long. Dioical or polygamous, 



689. Fagus heterophyla Raf. Bark and 

 branches grey, branchlets terete, leaves subpe- 

 tiolate ovate obovate rhomboidal and elliptic, 

 acute at both ends, remotely uncinate serrulate 

 above,, sometimes jagged on one side, margin 

 and nerves pilose, surface yellowish green con- 

 color, aments on long filiform pilose peduncles, 

 nuts ovate angles obtuse — Our Grey Beech is a 

 rare tree, smaller than the last, occasionaly 

 met in the dry hills of the Alleghanies, leaves 

 thin about biuncial of a yellowish cast, quite en- 

 tire till the middle then serrulate and subacu- 

 minate. 



690* Fagus ferruginea Ait. purpurea of 



