30 HOUGH'S AMERICAN WOODS. 



GENUS CASTANEA, TOUKN. 



Leaves alternate, strongly straight-veined, acuminate and expanding before tlie 

 flowers. Sterile flowers clustered in long naked cyliudric axillary catkins; calyx 5-6 

 parted; stamens 5-20 with slender filaments and 2-celled anthers. Fertile flowers 

 usually three together inclosed in an ovoid, 4-lobed, scaly invoiucral cup; calyx 5-6 

 lobed, adherent to the 3-7- celled, 6-1 4-ovuled ovary; stigmas awn-shaped and as many 

 as the cells; abortive stamens 5-12. Fruit a globose, hard, very prickly, 4-valved 

 dehiscent involucre, inclosing each, 1-3 coriaceous 1-seeded nuts; cotyledons very 

 thick. 



Trees and shrubs. (*' Gastanea " is the ancient Greek name of the chestnut.) 



40. CASTANEA VESCA, Var. AMERICANA, MICHX. 

 CHESTNUT. 



Ger., Kastanie ; Fr., Chdtaignier j Sp., Castanet. 



SPECIFIC CHARACTERS. Leaves oblong-lanceolate, pointed, coarsely serrate, the 

 mucronate teeth projecting with the straight veinlets; smooth and green both sides 

 when mature, 6-9 inches in length. Flowers appear in June or July, the long yellow 

 catkins quite equaling the leaves in length. Fruit (October) a spiny invoiucral burr 

 containing usually 2-3 ovoid nuts variously compressed according to the number in 

 each burr, and smooth excepting near the extremity where it is villous. 



A lofty tree with firm longitudinally furrowed gray bark. It is some- 

 times nearly or quite 100 ft. (30 m.) in height and with trunk sometimes 

 10 ft. (3 m. ) in diameter. 



HABITAT. Eastern United States, north to about the latitude of 

 central New York; south about to the Gulf States and west to the 

 Mississippi river, said to reach its greatest development on the western 

 slopes of the southern Alleghanies. 



PHYSICAL PROPERTIES. Wood light, soft, very coarse-grained, dura- 

 ble in contact with the soil, not very strong and liable to warp in drying. 

 The heart-wood is of a brownish color and the thin sap-wood lighter. 

 Specific Gravity, 0.4504; Percentage of Ash, 0.18; Relative Approximate 

 Fuel Value, 0.4496; Coefficient of Elasticity, 85621; Modulus of Rup- 

 ture, 696; Resistance to Longitudinal Pressure, 381; Resistance to In- 

 dentation, 106; Weight of a Culic Foot in Pounds, 28.07. 



USES. The timber is largely used for interior finishing, cabinet- 

 work, etc., and its great durability renders it especially serviceable for 

 fence-posts, rails, etc.* 



It is a valuable wood for charcoal and the bark which is rich in tannin 

 is valuable for the tanner and may be used as a dye. The sweet and 

 delicious nuts of this tree are too well known to require comment. 



MEDICINAL PROPERTIES. The leaves have been found to possess some 

 remedial value in the treatment of whooping-cough. They yield their 



*We have recently received from Haydn Brown, Esq., of West Newbury, Mass., apiece 

 of a fence rail of this timber which he says was exposed to the weather one hundred years, as 

 he has good reason to believe. 



