OLEACE^E 853 



dark green above, paler below, glabrous with the exception of occasional tufts of rufous 

 hairs along the under side of the broad pale midrib, 4 '-5' long and l'-2' wide, with many 

 conspicuous primary veins arcuate near the margins and obscurely reticulate ve inlets; turn- 

 ing rusty brown and falling early in the autumn. Flowers polygamous, without a peri- 

 anth, appearing before the leaves in a compact or ultimately elongated panicle 4'-5' long, 

 and covered in the bud by broad-ovate dark brown or nearly black scales rounded at apex; 

 staminate flowers on separate trees or mixed with perfect flowers, and consisting of 2 large 

 deeply pitted oblong dark purple apiculate anthers attached on the back to short broad 

 filaments; pistillate flower consisting of a long slender style deeply divided into 2 broad 

 purple stigmas and often accompanied by 1 or 2 perfect or globose rudimentary pink an- 

 thers sessile or borne on long or short filaments. Fruit in open panicles 8'-10' in length, 

 oblong to slightly oblong-obovate, I'-lf ' long and %' wide, with a thin wing, surrounding 

 the short flat faintly nerved body, rounded and emarginate at apex and narrowed and 

 rounded or cuneate at base. 



A tree, occasionally 80-90 high, with a tall trunk rarely exceeding 20' in diameter, 

 slender mostly upright branches forming a narrow head, and stout terete branchlets dark 

 green and slightly puberulous when they first appear, soon becoming ashy gray or orange 

 color and marked by large pale lenticels, growing darker during their first winter and then 

 roughened by the large suborbicular leaf-scars displaying a semicircular row of conspicuous 

 fibro- vascular bundle-scars; usually much smaller. Whiter-buds: terminal broad-ovate, 

 acute, rather less than \' long, with 3 pairs of scales, those of the outer pair thick and 

 rounded on the back at base, gradually narrowed and acute at apex, dark brown, slightly 

 puberulous, falling as the bud begins to enlarge in the spring, and shorter than the scales of 

 the inner rows coated on the outer surface with rufous pubescence, those of the second pair 

 becoming strap-shaped, 1' long, \' wide, and about half as long as the pinnate usually folia- 

 ceous inner scales. Bark of the trunk gray slightly tinged with red, $'-' thick, and divided 

 into large irregular plates separating into thin papery scales. Wood heavy, rather soft, 

 not strong, tough, coarse-grained, durable, easily separable into thin layers, dark brown, 

 with thin light brown often nearly white sapwood; largely used for the interior finish of 

 houses and in cabinet-making, and for fences, barrel hoops, and in the manufacture of 

 baskets. 



Distribution. Deep cold swamps and the low banks of streams and lakes; southern 

 Newfoundland and the northern shores of the Gulf of St. Lawrence to Lake Winnipeg, and 

 southward to New Castle County, Delaware, the mountains of West Virginia, southwest- 

 ern Indiana (Knox County; now probably exterminated by drainage), central Iowa, 

 central Missouri, and northwestern Arkansas. 



2. FOKESTEERA Poir. Swamp Privet. 

 Adelia Michx. 



Trees or shrubs, witfi thin close bark, slender branchlets, and small scaly buds. Leaves 

 simple, entire or serrulate, petiolate, deciduous Dr persistent. Flowers dioecious or polyga- 

 mous, minute, on slender ebracteolate pedicels, in fascicles or panicles, their bracts caducous, 

 from buds in the axils of leaves of the previous year and covered with numerous scales; 

 calyx reduced to a narrow ring or cup-shaped, 5 or 6-lobed; corolla 0; stamens hypogynous; 

 filaments 2-4, anthers ovoid, opening by lateral slits; ovary 2-celled, gradually narrowed 

 into a slender style terminating in an abruptly enlarged 2-lobed stigma; ovules 2 in each 

 cell, suspended from its apex; raphe dorsal. Fruit 1 or very rarely 2-celled, drupaceous, 

 oblong or subglobose, with thin flesh and a thin-walled stone; seed 1 in each cell, pendulous, 

 testa membranaceous; albumen fleshy; cotyledons plane, nearly filling the cavity of the 

 stone. 



Forestiera with 14 species is distributed from the southern United States and Mexico 

 through Central America to Paraguay, and through the West Indies to Brazil. 



The generic name is in memory of the French physician and botanist Charles Lefores- 

 tiere. 



