TREES GROWING IN RICH SOIL. 181 



trees that are not evergreen, and there, as in New York state, 

 it is valued for its excellent timber. The light reddish-brown 

 wood has a fine, satin-like surface and is considerably made 

 into furniture, boxes and many small articles. It is also used 

 for fuel. As the tree occurs southward it is small, or it becomes 

 a shrub. A large amount of moisture is required by it that it 

 may thrive well. 



HAZEL-NUT. FILBERT. (Plate XCV) 



Cdrylus Americdna. 



Branches : greyish or pinkish brown. Twigs : pubescent, with pinkish hairs. 

 Leaves : simple ; alternate ; with hairy petioles ; ovate or almost rounded, with 

 pointed apex and slightly cordate or blunt at the base; irregularly and doubly 

 serrate ; dark green and almost glabrous above, paler and pubescent beneath. 

 Staminate catkins: long; solitary. Fruit: growing in the base of an involucre" 

 which is composed of two broad, leaf-like bracts, extending far above the nut 

 and deeply cut at the top ; green ; pubescent. Nut : golden brown ; almost 

 round ; shell, hard. Kernel: edible ; sweet. 



Nutting days are truly among the best of all the year, and 

 who that has been brought up in the country cannot recall 

 some dense thicket or low stone wall by which these bushes 

 grew. The filberts, as the nuts are often called, yield up 

 readily their treasures. One sharp blow on the smooth shell 

 will sever it in two, and the round, solid meat then rolls inno- 

 cently out. It has only to be picked up and eaten. 



One of the first signs that the season is advancing is to find 

 the hazel catkins hanging loosely and with their stigmas well out. 

 They then soon shed abundantly their pollen. Even during 

 the winter the staminate flower-buds shine brightly on the 

 bushes; but the demure pistillate ones lie hidden under their 

 scaly buds. They cling mostly, however, to the summit of the 

 branches where the golden dust can find them and the long 

 rays of sunshine linger upon them lovingly. 



