408 cupULiFERiE. (oak family.) 



2. C. pnniila, Michx. (Chinquapin.) Leaves oblong, acute, sen-ate 

 with pointed toeth, whitened-downy underneath ; nut solitary, not flattened. — 

 Sandy woods, from (Long Island'?) S. Penn. and Ohio, southward. June. — 

 Shnib or tree 6° -20° high. Inrolucres small, often spiked; the ovoid pointed 

 nut scarcely half as large as a common chestnut, very sweet. 



3. FAGUS, Tourn. Beech. 



Sterile flowers in small heads on drooping peduncles, with deciduous scale- 

 like bracts: calyx bell-shaped, 5-6-clcft: stamens 8-12: anthers 2-cclled. 

 Fertile flowers usually in pairs at the apex of a short peduncle, invested by nu- 

 merous awl-shaped bractlets, the inner gi-o^vn together at their bases to form the 

 involucre : calyx-lobes 4-5, awl-shaped ; ovary 3-eelled with 2 ovules in each 

 cell : styles 3, thread-like, stigmatic along the inner side. Nuts sharply 3-srdcd, 

 usually 2 in each um-shaped and soft-prickly coriaceous involucre, which splits 

 to below tlie middle into 4 valves. Cotyledons thick, folded and somewhat 

 united ; but rising and expanding in germination. Trees with smooth ash-gray 

 bark, undivided strongly straight-veined leaves, and a light horizontal spray. 

 Scales of the taper buds formed of scaiious stipules. Flowers yellowisli, ap- 

 pearing with the leaves : peduncles axillary at the base of the branchlcts. ( The 

 classical name, from (jidym, to eat, in allusion to the esculent nuts.) 



1. F. ferrug^inea, Ait. (American Beech.) Leaves oblong-ovate, 

 taper-pointed, distinctly and often coarsely toothed ; petioles and midrib soon 

 nearly naked; prickles of the fruit recurved or spreading. (F. fen-uginea and 

 F. sylvestris, Michx. f.) — Woods; common, especially northward, and along the 

 AUcghanies southward. May. — Leaves longer and less shining than in the 

 European Beech, most of the silky hairs early deciduous ; the lower surface thou 

 nearly smooth. 



4. c6rYL.US, Tourn. Hazel-nut. Filbert. 



Sterile flowers in drooping cylindrical catkins ; the concave bracts and the 

 2-cleft calyx combined into 3-lobed scales, to the axis of which the 8 short 

 filaments in-egularly cohere : anthers 1-celled. Fertile flowers several together 

 in lateral and terminal scaly buds. Ovaiy 2-celled with 1 ovule in each : stig- 

 mas 2, thread-like. Nut bony, ovoid, separately enclosed in a large leafy-coria- 

 ceous involucre, which is composed of 2 or 3 united bracts tubular at the base, 

 and lacerated above. — Shrubs flowering in early spring, before the (roundish 

 unequally serrate) leaves appear. (The classical name, probably from Kopvs, 

 a helmet, from the involucre. ) 



1. C. Americana, Walt. (Wild Hazel-nut.) Leaves roundish-heart- 

 shaped, pointed, coarsely serrate ; involucre glandular-downy, with a dilated flattened 

 border, about twice the length of the globular nut. — Thickets ; common . — Shrub 

 4° -8° high; the young twigs, &c., downy and glandular-hairy. Nut of fine 

 flavor, bat smaller and thicker-shelled than the European Hazel-nut. , 



2. C. rostrata, Ait. (Beaked Hazel-nut.) Leaves ovate or ovate-ob- 

 long, somewhat hear>.-shaped, pointed, doubly serrate ; involucre much prolonged 

 above the globular-ovoid nut into a narrow tubular beak, densely bristly. — Banl.s 



