1918] SARGENT—QUERCUS 425 
branchlets and oblong-ovate acute winter buds 5-6 cm. in length, 
covered with glabrous or rarely slightly pubescent yellowish brown 
scales scarious on the margins. The leaves are always furnished be- 
low with large conspicuous tufts of hairs in the axils of the veins and 
on the upper branchlets are deeply divided by broad sinuses into nar- 
row acute lobes, and although often larger resemble in shape those of 
Q. texana, but the lower leaves are 7-lobed with short broad lobes 
separated by narrow sinuses pointed or rounded in the bottom, and 
are often 15-20 cm. long and 10-12 cm. wide, and are broadly 
acuminate or truncate at base. The nuts are oblong-ovate, nar- 
rowed and rounded at apex, frequently 3 cm. long and 2 cm. in 
diameter, the base only inclosed in a shallow saucer-shaped cup 
covered with thin or often with conspicuously tuberculate pale 
pubescent or nearly glabrous scales. Leaves of sterile branchlets 
from the tops of this tree are often difficult to distinguish from 
those of Q. texana, and the best characters by which these oaks can 
be distinguished are found in the red brown more or less pubescent 
buds and reddish branchlets of Q. fexana and its varieties, and in 
the usually glabrous grayish buds and grayish branchlets of Q. 
Shumardii and its variety. The close relationship of these’ trees is 
shown, however, in the occasional occurrence in Missouri of trees 
of Q. Shumardii with reddish, slightly pubescent buds and reddish 
branchlets, . 
Quercus Shumardii ranges from eastern Texas through the valley of the 
Mississippi River to northern Missouri, southern Loomssaiea sae Ppt and 
western Ohio, ents through the Gulf and south Atl h Carolina. 
nder f. nditions it becomes one of the largest of aches oaks, and 
individuals u: up ‘- 4o m. in height with trunks 1.5 m. in diameter and much 
buttressed at the base are not rare. Trees with the much thickened and with 
the thin cup-scales grow together over the whole region occupied by this 
species. The fruit with thin cup-scales is often difficult to distinguish from 
that of the northern red oak, and it is Q. Shumardii which has often been mis- 
taken for it in the eastern Gulf states, where the northern tree is extremely rare, 
and in southern Missouri and in Texas, where it does not appear to grow. 
On the trees with the saucer-shaped cups others occur with deep cup- 
shaped cups. This is the Q. Schneckii Britton, and as the trees with the 
shallow and with the deep cups do not otherwise differ, the latter is best con- 
sidered a variety of the former. If this view is adopted it becomes 
¥ Quercus SHumarpt var. Schneckii, n. var. 
