BILTMORE BOTANICAL STUDIES 



57 



remarkable proportions. The species is not uncommon in moist woods and on 

 banks of streams in southeastern Tennessee and northwestern Georgia. 



The type material, which is preserved in the Biltmore Herbarium, was found 

 at Chattanooga, Tennessee, and represents both flowers (B42J4) and fruit 

 {B4234 2 ) from the same tree. 



Crataegus penita n. sp. 



A tree 4-6™ tall with a short trunk sometimes 2.5 dm in diam- 

 eter, clothed with brownish-gray bark, the stout, ascending or 

 spreading branches forming a wide-spreading crown : young twigs 

 sparsely pubescent, becoming glabrous, marked with pale lenti- 

 cels : leaves broadly obovate, oval or ovate, 2.5-6 cm long, 2-5 cm 

 wide, acute at the apex, contracted or rounded at the base, the 

 borders serrate and shallowly incised ; they are but slightly pubes- 

 cent when young, showing only some fine, soft, white hairs on the 

 upper surface, especially along the midrib, trough of the petiole 

 and lower portions of the veins and in their axils beneath, becom- 

 ing glabrous in age, firm to subcoriaceous in texture, deep green, 

 fading with tones of yellow, orange and brown : petioles 5 mm - 

 2 cm long, slightly pubescent, at least when young, margined : 

 flowers i5-i8 mm wide, appearing during the latter part of April or 

 first of May and when the leaves are almost fully grown ; they are 

 produced in compound, usually many-flowered glabrous or gla- 

 brate corymbs : pedicels and hypanthium glabrous or bearing a 

 few weak hairs : sepals triangular-lanceolate, 3~5 mm long, glandu- 

 lar-serrate or entire, reflexed after anthesis : stamens about 20, the 

 anthers faintly pink or almost white : fruit, which ripens in Octo- 

 ber, globose or depressed-globose, 8-io mm wide, red at maturity, 

 the flesh firm : nutlets 3-5, about 6 mm long, the lateral surfaces 

 nearly plane and the back either smooth or slightly ridged and 

 grooved, the hypostyle occupying two-thirds of the ventral angle. 



Cratcegus penita is abundantly represented in southeastern Tennessee, 

 growing in low woods and on the banks of streams, and is most likely to occur in 

 similar situations in adjacent Georgia and Alabama. 



The type material, collected at Chattanooga, Tennessee, and representing 

 flowers {B4233) and fruit {B42JJ 2 ) from the same tree, is preserved in the Bilt- 

 more Herbarium. At this station are numerous examples of this thorn, the 

 largest of them with the aspect of well developed apple trees. The broad, bright 

 but deep green leaves, symmetrical, spreading crown and size of trunk, present 

 characters that commend this species to planters and horticulturists. 



