118 
THE MONTHLY FLORA. 
of white and pink, and the deep green of its digitated leaves, make 
it look like a mountain of ivory and emeralds, but this effect soon 
gives place to its shadowy depth of coloring. In the beginning of 
spring, one rainy day is sufficient to cause this beautiful tree to 
cover itself with verdure. If it be planted alone, nothing surpasses 
the elegance of its stately pyramid of from fifty to sixty feet, the 
beauty of its foliage, or the richness of its flowers, which in May 
or June, make it appear like an immense lustre or chandelier all 
covered with pearls. Fond of ostentation and richness, it covers 
with flowers the grass it overshadows and yields to the idler a 
most delightful shade. The nuts and capsules are large, mahogany 
colored, and are in great request among the rising generation, in 
the construction of potato mills. Though they yield a fine starch, 
still not in sufficient quantity to make it an object in the cultivation 
of the tree. In our western states, they have been successfully 
used to poison fish. Taken as a whole they rank in the merely 
ornamental class, for though cattle, especially the Deer, eat the nuts 
with avidity, to man they are acrid and unpalatable, evidently not 
intended for his food. The timber is of little service, beino- soft 
and perishable. The bark it is said is of some service in tanning, 
and the nuts, besides the properties we have named, have a soapy 
quality, which the peasants in some countries employ advanta- 
geously. Its generic name is derived from Esculus, a tree which 
furnished the Romans with an eatable fruit. The specific name 
meaning Horse Chesnut, was given because the Turks grind the 
nuts and mix them with corn, for their steeds. It is the emblem of 
Luxury. 
“There avenues of chesnuts high, 
With vaulted roofs conceal the sky.’* 
