Iv. 1. THE BUTTERNUT OR OIL NUT. 183 
a prolonged point, serrate, rather thick and rough, and lighter 
colored beneath. The buds are destitute of external scales. 
The sterile flowers issue from the sides of last year’s shoots, in 
large green catkins four to seven inches long, and four or five 
eighths of an inch or more in diameter. They are on oblong, 
shield-like, green scales, disposed pretty closely on all sides of the 
catkins. Hach scale terminates in a brown, hairy tuft, above 
which are three lanceolate, pointed lobes, with two lateral lobes 
midway of the scale. The stamens are about eight to twelve, 
sessile, brown on the upper surface, which, by the pendence of 
the catkins, becomes the lower. 
Fertile flowers, two, six or seven on a terminal downy stalk. 
Each is surrounded by an involucre of several broad scales, 
forming at base the oblong cup, and within them are five or six 
narrow, pointed sepals, immediately investing the long style, 
which terminates in a large purple or rose-red stigma, deeply 
cleft, two to three eighths of an inch long. The cup, which 
enlarges to become the fruit, is invested with numerous reddish 
or white glands, which exude a penetrating, viscid substance. 
The leaf-stalks and recent shoots are set with similar glands 
in less number. 
The flowers appear in May, and the fruit ripens in October. 
The fruit grows single or two to five together on the sides and 
end of a stout, pliable footstalk, which is one to three inches 
long. They are green, turning to brown, oblong-ovoid, or in- 
versely pear-shaped, invested with glandular hairs, which se- 
crete a clammy, resinous and penetrating odorous substance, and 
crowned by the stigma and ends of the calyx scales. Within 
a thin, leathery husk, they contain a nut about two inches long, 
and of half that thickness, covered with stony, opposite, keel- 
like projections, and sculptured with deep furrows and sharp 
irregular ridges. It is rounded at base, and acute at the end, 
and about an inch in diameter. The kernel of this nut is of one 
piece, but can with difficulty be extracted whole. Tt is of an 
oily nature, and soon becomes rancid; but when carefully dried 
is sweet and very pleasant. 
The butternut tree abounds on the Hoosic Mountains, among 
the Green Mountains, on the sides of the Wachusett, and par- 
