CUFULIFKR^. 245 



QUERCUS, L. (Oak.) Stamiiiate flowers in groups of slender 

 hanging catkins; stamens 5 or more, surrounded by sepal-like bracts, 

 to S in number. Pistillate flowers axillary and erect; ovary sur- 

 rounded by an adnate calyx, the limb of which is toothed; style 

 short ; stigma 3-lobed ; ovary 3-celled, rarely 4-5, containing ovules, 

 5 of which are abortive. Fruit oblong, somewhat in the form of a 

 modern musket-cartridge, with the base inserted in a cup, which is 

 clothed with imbricated scales. F'lowers greenish, appearing in regions 

 of frost during the month of May. Leaves simple, alternate, stipulate, 

 deciduous, but persistent. A few evergreen in the southern fringe of 

 the north temperate zone. 



1, Q. alba, L. (White Oak.) Trunk 60 to 80 feet high, 4 to 5 feet in 

 diameter ; bark grayish-white ; much-branched. Leaves 3 to 5 inches long, 

 sinuatc-lobed, in opposite pairs, 1 to 4 pairs of lobes, with a terminal one ; lobes 

 coarsely and irregularly toothed, pubescent underneath ; acorn on short 

 peduncles, large and sweet, edible. 



Var. pinnatifida, Mx. Like Q. alba, except the leaves, which have 3 to 4 

 pairs of well marked lobes. 



Var. repanda, Mx. Leaves with a wavy margin. 



Geofjraphjj. — The oak thrives best in the temperate zones, above 35°, and 

 is found in a zone between 30° and 60° quite around the globe. It is found 

 in the mountain-top as well as in the valley and the plain below, and is indig- 

 enous in tlie al)0ve-named parallels in both liemispheres. The white oak is 

 common in the L'uited States and Canada. 



Etymology. — Qitercus, the generic name, is derived from Latin quercus, an 

 oak. The popular name of the oak among the Celts was drew, from which the 

 word Druid was derived, signifying " priest of the oak." Alba, the specific 

 name of this species, is from the Latin alba, white, and is due to the grayish- 

 white bark of the trunk. Oak comes from the Anglo-Saxon name of the 

 tree, dc. 



History. — The oak is famous in all ancient writings in which trees are 

 mentioned. Among the Gauls it was held sacred. Oak groves were the abodes 

 of priests, and no religious ceremony was complete without oak-boughs or 

 oak-leaves. The Greeks and Romans also dedicated the oak to their gods ; 

 and the Roman peasants initiated the harvest by a festival, in which their 

 heads were adorned with wreaths woven with the leaves of the oak. It was 

 upon the oak that the Druid priests found the mistletoe, which figured so 

 largely in their religious ceremonies. 



Manv oaks are noted for liistorical events. Less than a hundred years 

 ago the oak was still standing in tlie Xew Forest against which the arrow 

 glanced that killed WiUiam Rufus. The Royal Oak at Boscobel concealed 

 the person of Charles 11. after the di.sastrous battle at Worcester The oak 

 at Torwood, at the place where Wallace convened his followers, still stands. 

 xVlfred's Oak, at r)xford, which was in e.xistence when the university was 

 founded, may still be seen. And in our own country an oak in the city of 

 Hartford, Conn., concealed the charter of that colony, and was known after 

 wards as the Charter Oak. 



Abraham's ^)ak ((^ pseudococcifera), near Hebron, in Palestine, is many hun- 

 dred years old ; it measures twenty-three feet in circumference, and its branches 

 extend forty-five feet from the stem, forming a head ninety feet in diameter 



