TREES GROWING IN RICH SOIL. i 73 



AMERICAN CHESTNUT. (Plate LXXXIX.) 



Castanea dentdta. 



FAMILY SHAPE HEIGHT RANGE TIME OF BLOOM 



Beech. Round-topped; 5080 feet or higher. Southern Maine to June, July, 



branches, spreading. Fla. and Tenn. Sept., Oct. 



Bark : granite-grey ; ridged, but smooth in young trees. Leaves * simple ; 

 alternate; with short petioles; oblong-lanceolate; pointed at both ends or 

 rounded at the base ; feather-veined ; coarsely serrate; the ribs terminating in 

 the sharp, bristle-pointed teeth of the edge. Sinuses: rounded. Dark green 

 above, lighter coloured below; glabrous. Sterile flowers: yellow; sweet- 

 scented; growing in slender, axillary catkins; fertile ones, about three or four 

 in each involucre. Fruit: growing in a green, prickly husk, which opens in 

 four sections and discloses three or four ovoid nuts, flattened on one or both 

 sides; brown, and tipped with a white remnant of the style. Seldom more than 

 three fully developed; edible ; sweet. 



" Under a spreading chestnut tree 



The village smithy stands ; 

 The smith, a mighty man is he, 



With large and sinewy hands; 

 And the muscles of his brawny arms 



Are strong as iron bands." 



Fortunate, indeed, was the good smith immortalized by 

 Longfellow to be able to cool himself from his labours at the 

 forge under the voluminous, kindly shade of the chestnut tree. 

 It has, perhaps, the heart of a humanitarian. Country urchins 

 surely forget the need of money when they find, after a light 

 frost, the ground covered with its inviting nuts, and many a be- 

 grimmed Italian is consoled by them for the fortune he expected 

 to find in the new world. Early and late in the autumn we see 

 these men standing on the streets of the cities making with 

 their time-worn knives a cross upon the nuts, and then roasting 

 them in their little machines. Although they are smaller than 

 the nuts of the European varieties, their meat has a sweeter 

 flavour and a finer grain. Owing to their small size, however, 

 the labour of preparing these native chestnuts for cooking is 

 considerable, and this is perhaps the reason that chestnut 

 purde and pudding are not so frequent in this country as they 

 are in Europe. 



The tree at all times is an imposing and beautiful object. 



