34 



BRITISH FOREST TREES. 



a number of kinds, termed distinct species, growing 

 in Britain, of foreign derivation— the Tm'kisli oak, 

 Quercus Cerris ; the Lucombe oak, Q. sempey^vu 

 rens ; the scarlet-leaved American, Q. coccinea ; the 

 evergreen, Q. Ilex, and several others. The Tmrkish 

 and I^ucombe resemble each other, but the latter 

 generally continues green till the spring, when the 

 old leaves wither, a little before the young appear : 

 Botanists make them varieties. We consider the 

 Turkish oak the most valuable and elegant of these 

 foreign kinds. The leaves are generally very long 

 and slender, deeply and widely sinuated, and the 

 teeth or salient angles sometimes undulated, having 

 a curled appearance ; yet there are some individuals 

 with broad, short, flat leaves, not differing in figure 

 from those of the common oak, but the tree in other 

 respects not different from the Turkish, being easily 

 distinguished from the common oak by the reddish 

 hairy appearance of the developing shoot, the scales 

 of the bud having a hair-like extension, visible in each 

 leaf axilla. The acorns are also bristled like echini, 

 with this scaly prolongation. The timber is tough 

 and clean, resembling the white American, and suit- 

 able for staves. The stem and branches are gene- 

 rally very straight, as the terminal bud seldom fails, 

 and the growing proceeds steadily, without much 

 autumnal shoot. 



