708 



TREKS OF NORTH AMERICA 



coarsely often doubly serrate above with incurved teeth, slightly pubescent early in the 

 season along the upper side of the midrib and veins, and glabrous or slightly pubescent 

 below, and at maturity thin, lustrous and glabrous, dark green on the upper surface, 

 pale yellow-green on the lower surface, often furnished with conspicuous tufts of axillary 

 hairs, 3^'-6' long and l-J'-lf ' wide, with a thin midrib and from 18-30 pairs of slender pri- 

 mary veins. Flowers in narrow pubescent panicles, 4-|'-8' in length, on slender pubescent 

 pedicels; calyx tubular, dark red, puberulous on both surfaces, minutely lobed, the lobes 

 rounded, much shorter than the light red petals; petals conni vent, unequal, oblong-obovate, 



Fig. 637 



rounded at apex, glandular on the outer surface and on the margins, gradually narrowed 

 below into a long slender villose claw; claw of the lateral petals about as long or shorter 

 than the calyx, those of the superior pair much longer than the calyx, their blades not more 

 than one-third as large as the blades of the lateral pair; stamens exserted; filaments villose 

 like the ovary. Fruit obovoidor subglobose, light brown, smooth, generally pitted, usually 

 1 or 2-seeded, pendulous on slender stems; seeds usually about 1' in diameter, dark chest- 

 nut-brown and lustrous with a small hilum. 



Occasionally a tree, rarely 40 high, with a tall trunk 8'-10' in diameter covered with 

 smooth dark bark, large erect branches forming an open head, and stout light orange-brown 

 branchlets marked in their second year by conspicuous emarginate scars of fallen leaves 

 showing the ends of 3 fibro-vascular bundles; usually a shrub, often flowering when not 

 more than 3' high. 



Distribution. Southeastern Virginia, southward to western Florida to the valley of the 

 Suwanee River (near Old Town, Lafayette County), and westward to eastern Louisiana, 

 usually in the neighborhood of the coast; in Alabama ranging inland to Jefferson and Dallas 

 Counties and in Louisiana to West Feliciana Parish; in southern Kentucky (near Bowling 

 Green, Warren County). 



