170 ^SCULUS 



longer than the petals. Fruit spiny, i\ ins. across, containing one, sometimes 

 two, of the well-known lustrous brown nuts. 



The horse-chestnut is at once the best-known and the most beautiful of 

 flowering trees of the largest size. The stately, spreading form of fully grown 

 trees is appropriately accompanied by noble proportions and handsome shape 

 of leaf, and by large, striking flower-clusters. An English park can afford no 

 finer sight than a group of horse-chestnuts towards the end of May, when 

 every branchlet carries its erect cone of white flowers. The history of the 

 horse-chestnut is interesting. It reached Western Europe by way of 

 Constantinople in 1576, when seeds were sent to the botanist Clusius at 

 Vienna, and it had spread westwards to France and England early in the 

 seventeenth century. For more than two hundred and fifty years its real 

 native country was unknown. N. India was long regarded as its most prob- 

 able home, and Loudon, as late as 1837, suggested N. America. Its real wild 

 habitat is now definitely established as being much nearer home ; namely, in 

 the mountainous, uninhabited wilds of Northern Greece and Albania, where 

 several observers have found it to be undoubtedly indigenous. 



The economic value of the horse-chestnut is not great. The timber is soft 

 and lacking in strength, and is chiefly employed in the manufacture of kitchen 

 utensils, toys, and other articles for which durability is not of great importance. 

 The nuts are abundantly produced, and are eaten by some animals, notably 

 deer. I have noticed the deer in Bushey Park, at the time the nuts are falling, 

 race eagerly for them as they drop to the ground. Loudon and others suggest 

 various uses for them, but so far as I can learn there is no systematic demand 

 for them. They have such an extraordinary fascination for boys in furnishing 

 the material- for the game of "conkers" (conquerors), that the value of the 

 species as a communal tree is in some districts seriously diminished by their 

 efforts with sticks and stones to bring down the nuts before they naturally fall. 



The species has produced various forms under cultivation, the best of which is 



Var. FLORE PLENO, with double flowers. This variety, according to 

 Mr A. N. Baumann, was noticed by him as a sport on a tree of the ordinary 

 type growing in the garden of a Mons. Duval, near Geneva, during the 

 years 1819 to 1822. He sent grafts to his father's famous nursery at 

 Bollwiller, in Alsace, whence it spread into cultivation. Its flowers last 

 longer than those of the type, and as no nuts are formed, the tree escapes the 

 danger of injury just alluded to. For public places it is strongly to be 

 recommended. Other varieties are : 



Var. CRISPUM. A tree of compact, rather pyramidal habit, with short, 

 broad leaflets. 



Var. FOLIIS AUREIS VARIEGATIS. Leaves blotched with yellow ; a variety 

 to be avoided. 



Var. LACINIATA (AL. asplenifolia, Hort.\ An extraordinary curiosity of 

 little beauty, whose leaflets are sometimes nine in number, but often reduced 

 to the mere midrib with jagged remains of blade attached. 



Var. DIGITATA. Leaflets short, narrow, often reduced to three, of linear 

 shape ; the main-stalk frequently very markedly winged. 



Var. MEMMINGERI. Leaves pale greenish or greyish, yellow when they 

 first expand. Of no merit. 



Var. PR^ECOX. A form which breaks into leaf and flower ten to fourteen 

 days in advance of the ordinary form. Where late spring frosts frequently 

 cause damage, this form is to be avoided. There are two large trees at Kew. 



Var. PYRAMIDALIS. Branches growing upwards at an angle of 45 to the 

 main stem. This would probably be useful as a street tree, and avoid to a 

 large extent the drastic pruning so often practised to keep the ordinary form 

 within bounds. 



Var. UMBRACULIFERA forms a low, dense, rounded head of branches. 

 A fine example is in the nursery of Messrs Simon-Louis at Metz. 



