100 CUPULIFEILE. Castanopsis. 



flowers 1 to 3 in a scaly involucre sessile at the base of the aments ; lobes of the 

 perianth 6, in 2 rows. Styles usually 3. Ovary 3-celled, with 2 amphitropous 

 ovules at the lower angle of each cell. Nuts 1 to 3, enclosed in the subglobose in- 

 volucre, which is densely covered with stout branched prickles, at length irregularly 

 dehiscent. Seed solitary. Cotyledons thick, plano-convex, edible. Trees or some- 

 times shrubs, mostly with entire coriaceous leaves ; fruit maturing in the second 

 year. 



A peculiar genus of Eastern Asia and the adjacent islands, of a dozen or more species, repre- 

 sented in California only by the following. It is intermediate between Quercus and Castanea, 

 the former differing in its cupular l-flo\vered involucre, imperfectly 3-celled ovary, and unisexual 

 aments ; the latter in the usually 6-celled ovary, pendent anatropous ovules, and the cotyledons 

 convolute-plicate. The shell of the nut is much firmer and harder than in the other genera. 



1. C. chrysophylla, A. DC. Leaves coriaceous, evergreen, lanceolate or ob- 

 long, 1 to 4 inches long, acuminate or only acutish, cuneate at base and shortly peti- 

 oled, entire, green and glabrous above or sometimes scurfy, densely scurfy beneath 

 with more or less yellow scales : male aments 1 to 3 inches long, densely pubescent : 

 styles 3, stout, glabrous, divergent: fruiting involucre with stout divergent spines, 

 ^ to 1 inch long, subverticillately many-branched : nut usually solitary, obtusely 

 triangular, 6 lines long. Seem. Journ. Bot. i. 182, & Prodr. xvi 2 . 109; Wat- 

 son, Bot. King Exp. 322. Castanea chrysophylla, Dougl.; Hook, in Lond. Journ. 

 Bot. ii. 496, t. 16, and Bot. Mag. t. 4953; dewberry, Pac. K. Rep. vi. 26, fig. 4. 

 Castanea sempervirens, Kellogg, Proc. Calif. Acad. i. 71. 



From Oregon to Monterey, and in the Sierra Nevada to an altitude of 6,000 feet. Often only a 

 shrub of 2 to 6 feet in height (var. minor, Benth. PI. Hartw. 337), fruiting freely, but in Mendo- 

 cino County and northward becoming a large tree 50 to 125 feet high and 2 or 3 feet in 

 diameter. 



ORDER XCVI. CORYLACE-ffil. 



Distinguished from the Cupuliferce by the male flowers consisting of a staminifer- 

 ous scale-like bract without perianth, and by the foliaceous or tubular laciniate invo- 

 lucre of the fruit ; stamens several, with short often divided filaments and distinct 

 anther-cells, usually hairy at the apex ; pistillate flowers in a short spike, 2 to each 

 bract, with small bractlets which become much enlarged and involucrate in fruit ; 

 ovary imperfectly 2-celled, with 2 pendulous anatropous ovules ; seed solitary, with 

 simple integument. Leaves doubly toothed, plicate in estivation. Involucre acid 

 to the taste. 



Small trees or shrubs of the northern hemisphere, the order comprising the Hornbeam and 

 Ironwood (Ostrya and Carpinus) of the Atlantic States and Old World (a half-dozen species), a 

 small genus peculiar to Japan (Distcyocarpus), and the following one. The wood is usually very 

 hard and heavy. 



1. CORYLUS, Tourn. HAZELNUT. FILBERT. 



Aments drooping, axillary from scaly buds, densely pubescent. Stamens 4 (or 8 

 with one-celled anthers by division of the filaments), 2-bracteolate, on a cuneate- 

 obovate bract. Pistillate spikes terminal on leafy shoots. Ovary tipped with the 

 irregularly lobed limb of the adherent perianth ; style short, with 2 linear elon- 

 gated stigmas. Bractlets 2, becoming a leafy or somewhat coriaceous often tubu- 

 lar involucre, with lacerately lobed margin, enclosing an ovoid bony 1-celled 1-seeded 



