Keegan: The Hazel {Cory his avelland). 



twig's, consists at first of wide, yellowish, thin-walled cells, but 

 later on a series of brown flat-celled layers alternate with these, 

 and the former, being- soft, burst, peel off in shreds, and remain 

 as a sort of debris on the exterior of the older shoots ; so that 

 the bark of the branches eventually becomes of a brown-red 

 shade streaked with abundant lenticels, finally becoming smooth 

 and silvery grey, but it is only at the base of the trunk of a very 

 old tree that a secondary periderm (rhytidome) is ever developed 

 furrowed and scaly. The wood contains much starch all the 

 year round, also free phloroglucin, coniferin, and a little tannin ; 

 the vessels are rich in glucose in summer and winter ; in October 

 and throughout the winter the central pith is quite devoid of 

 starch, and by mid November the starch also vanishes from the 

 bark until the ensuing March, when it reappears preparatory to 

 the unfolding of the leaf-buds. The bark contains about i per 

 cent, wax, fat, etc., a trace of carotin, 5 resin, nearly 3 tannin, 

 also free phloroglucin, glucose, and mucilage, and 6*6 ash in dry, 

 which in May contains 12*5 per cent, alkaline salts, 5 silica, 

 40 lime, 4*5 magnesia, and 2*7 P 2 O s . The wood yields 0*5 per 

 cent, of ash which in May contains 24*5 per cent, soluble 

 alkalies, 14 potass, 4*6 silica, 25 lime, 8*5 magnesia, and 10*4 

 P 2 0 5 . There is much iron in the bark, and much manganese in 

 the wood ; in fact, the whole tree absorbs a large amount of the 

 heavier minerals of the soil. No powerful vigour or redundancy 

 of growth is allotted to the Hazel. Its principal stem consum- 

 mates, so to speak, when it has attained a certain height, and 

 becomes replaced by straight, slender, very elongated shoots, 

 which evolve from the stock or from the roots (suckers). At 

 first the rooting apparatus is represented by a straight pivot 

 root clothed abundantly with hairs ; in about three years' time 

 this ceases to lengthen, and lateral roots are now developed 

 therefrom, one of which later on takes the lead, and is prolonged 

 far below the soil, while still retaining throughout nearly its 

 whole length an equal diameter. It is this remarkable capacity 

 of shooting by suckers that occasions the characteristic ' con- 

 centrated ' growth. According to Leipzig, the dry root yields 

 3*27 per cent, of ash which contains only 8*6 per cent, soluble 

 salts. 



Leaves. — The mesophyll is composed of two layers of pali- 

 sade cells occupying about half its thickness, and a very open 

 lacunar tissue with large granules of chlorophyll (heliophily) ; 

 the upper epidermis is clothed with long soft hairs, there is no 

 hypoderm beneath it, and the lower epidermis is hairy also in 



Naturalist, 



