BUTTERNUT. 
70 
finitively substituted for that of Cinerea^ by which it has hitherto been 
distinguished among botanists. This last appellation, derived from the 
color of the secondary branches, whose bark is smooth and grayish, suggests 
only an unimportant characteristic, while the first expresses one of the most 
interesting properties of the tree. 
The Butternut is found in Upper and Lower Canada, in the District of 
Maine, on the shores of Lake Erie, in the States of Kentucky and Tennes- 
see, and on the banks of the Missouri; but I have never met with it in the 
lower parts of the Carolinas, of Georgia, and of East Forida, where the 
nature of the soil and the intemperate heat of the summer, are unfavora- 
ble to its vegetation. In cold regions, on the contrary, its growth is luxu- 
riant, for in the State of Vermont,* where the winter is so rigorous that 
sledges are used during four months in the year, this tree attains a circum- 
ference of 8 or 10 feet. I have nowhere seen it more abundant, than in 
the bottoms which border the Ohio between Wheeling and Marietta : but 
the thickness of these forests which are hardly penetrated by the sun, ap- 
pears to prevent its utmost expansion. I have seen here no trees as large 
as some in New Jersey, on the steep and elevated banks of the Hudson, 
nearly opposite to the city of New York. The woods in this place are thin, 
and the soil cold, unproductive, and interspersed with large rocks, in the 
interstices of which the biggest Butternuts have their root. I have measured 
some of them, which, at 5 feet from the ground, were 10 or 12 feet in cir- 
cumference, and which were 50 feet in height, with roots extending even 
with the surface of the ground, in a serpentine direction, and with little 
variation in size, to the distance of 40 feet. The trunk ramifies at a 
small height, and the branches, seeking a direction more horizontal than 
those of other trees and spreading widely, form a large and tufted head, 
which gives the tree a remarkable appearance. 
The buds of the Butternut, like those of the Black Walnut, are uncov- 
ered. In the spring its vegetation is forward, and its leaves unfold a fort- 
nio-ht earlier than those of the Hickories. Each leaf is composed of 7 or 
8 pair of sessile leaflets, and terminated by a petiolated odd one. The 
leaflets are from 2 to 3 inches in length, lanceolate, serrate, and slightly 
downy. The barren flowers stand on large cylindrical aments, which are 
single, 4 or 5 inches long, and attached to the shoots of the preceding 
year ; the fertile flowers on the contrary, come out on the shoots of the 
same spring, and are situated at their extremity. The ovarium is crowned 
by twm rose colored stigmata. The fruit is commonly single, and suspended 
by a thin, pliable peduncle, about 3 inches in length ; its form is oblong- 
oval, without any appearance of seam. It is often 2è inches in length, 
and 5 inches in circumference, and is covered wdth a viscid adhesive sub- 
[ It occurs in all the New England states. Emerson.] 
