164 WOODY PLANTS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 
Tue AmericaAN CuestNut. Castanea vesca, Geertner, var. 
Americana, Michaux. 
Figured in Michaux; Sylva, IT, Plate 104. 
This is one of the largest and tallest of our forest trees. It 
rises with a straight, erect stem, hardly diminishing in size, to 
the height of sixty or seventy, and, in the forests in the south- 
west part of the State, to ninety or one hundred feet. ‘T'he 
bark on the old stocks is of a dark color, very hard and rugged, 
with long and deep clefts. In smaller trees, it is remarkably 
smooth, and so continues till they have attained a considerable 
size. When they are a foot or more in diameter, it begins to 
crack with long, superficial cracks, at the distance of two or 
three inches from each other. On each side of a branch, in the 
bark, is an oblique cleft; the two mectimg above the branch. 
The recent shoots are large, of a deep grecn, or bronzed, or 
purplish brown color, channelled with two grooves running 
down from the base of each leaf, and closely set with prominent 
white or gray dots. The older shoots are of a darker color. 
The leaves, which often come out in a diverging or radiant 
manner, are very long, from six to nine, and often ten or 
twelve inches, and one to two and a half or three inches wide, 
lance-shaped, tapering or rounded at base, ending in a very 
long point. The principal veins, which are regular, undivided 
and parallel, end in long, bent points, which are separated by 
large, curved indentations. They are green and polished 
above, and smooth and paler beneath, and are supported by 
stout footstalks, half an inch or an inch long. While quite 
young, they are covered with a glandular viscidity, but soon 
become smooth on both surfaces. On vigorous shoots from the 
stump, a pair of somewhat glutinous stipules, broad at base, 
and tapering to a point, defends the tender leaf, and continucs, 
bristling at right angles, to protect it, until the footstalk 1s 
longer than they, when they fall off. 
The male flowers, which come out later than those of any 
ther forest tree, are in large, spreading bunches of stiff catkins, 
as long as the leaves, of a yellowish green color, and conspicuous 
