NUT-BEARING TREES 



shall be ashamed not to plant the fruit trees 

 in public places, for the pleasure and the 

 refreshing of all who care. 



One of the commonest nut trees, and cer- 

 tainly one of the most pleasing, is the hickory. 

 There are hickories and hickories, and some 

 are shellbarks, while others are bitternuts or 

 pignuts. The form most familiar to the East- 

 ern States is the shagbark hickory, and its 

 characteristic upright trees, tall and finely 

 shaped, never wide -spreading as is the chest- 

 nut under the encouragement of plenty of 

 room and food, are admirable from any stand- 

 point. There is a lusty old shagbark in 

 Wetzel's Swamp that has given me many a 

 pleasant quarter -hour, as I have stood at 

 attention before its symmetrical stem, hung 

 with slabs of brown bark that seem always 

 just ready to separate from the trunk. 



The aspect of this tree is reflected in its 

 ;ery useful timber, which is pliant but tough, 

 requiring less ^^heft" for a given strength, and 

 bending with a load easily, only to instantly 

 snap back to its position when the stress 

 slackens. Good hickory is said to be stronger 



