59 
rounded at the base by the much enlarged and thickened scarlet calyx 
of the flower and is raised on a long bright red stalk. No other north¬ 
ern tree produces such brilliantly colored fruits. Unfortunately there 
is little time to enjoy it for the birds eagerly seek it as it ripens^ 
The living wood of the Sassafras is not attacked by borers and the 
leaves are not destroyed and are rarely disfigured by insects. The 
thick spongy roots of the Sassafras produce suckers freely and these 
with a little care can be safely transplanted. How many persons now 
plant the Sassafras and in what American nursery can it be found? 
It was, however, one of the first North American trees carried to 
Europe as it was established in England some time before the middle 
of the seventeenth century. Until 1879 when another species, S. tzumu, 
was discovered in central China, the American tree was believed to be 
the only Sassafras. The Chinese tree has been introduced into the 
Arboretum but unfortunately it has not proved hardy here. 
Buckeyes, as the American Horsechestnuts (Aesculus) and their nu¬ 
merous hybrids are usually called, are beautiful flowering trees and 
shrubs with yellow, scarlet or red and yellow flowers, but it is not 
perhaps generally realized that the color of their foliage in autumn 
often makes them as beautiful at this season of the year as they are 
when in flower. The autumn foliage is usually orange color but often 
orange and red, and rarely scarlet. The leaves of some of these plants 
in the Arboretum have already turned color and fallen; those of others 
are just beginning to turn from green to yellow, and others are still 
green. The first of these plants to assume autumn colors this year 
was the form of the Ohio Buckeye with leaves usually composed of 
seven leaflets {Aesculus glabra var. Buckleyi). From the group of 
trees of this variety the leaves had nearly all fallen two weeks ago. 
This variety grows chiefly in northern Missouri. On the variety of 
this tree from southern Missouri and Arkansas, distinguished chiefly 
by its pale smooth bark {Aesculus glabra var. leucodermis), only a few 
of the leaves are beginning to change from green to yellow. The most 
remarkable Buckeye, however, in the Arboretum this year has been 
one of the two plants of Aesculus glabra growing on the left hand side 
of the South Street entrance. These are the oldest Buckeyes in the 
Arboretum and were raised here from seeds collected in 1873 at Mt. 
Victory, Ohio. Of these two trees every leaf on the one nearest the 
wall was about the middle of September bright clear scarlet; and it is 
doubtful if any plant in the Arboretum has ever made a more brilliant 
autumn display. The leaves on the companion plant turned a few days 
later green and red. The leaves of self sown seedlings of these trees 
were on the first of October green or green beginning to change to 
yellow. The leaves of another Buckeye, Aesculus arguta, the little 
shrub from Oklahoma and Texas, turn early bright orange color and 
have already nearly all fallen. This handsome plant is related to the 
Ohio Buckeye in its prickly fruit but differs from it in its leaves with 
nine narrower longer-pointed leaflets, more elongated flower-clusters 
and dwarf habit. The leaves of the yellow-flowered tree Buckeye of 
the Appalachian Mountain slopes, Aesculus octandra and its variety ves- 
tita, turn yellow as do those of the summer flowering shrub Aesculus 
parvijiora, the best known of all the Buckeyes in American gardens. 
