The Beech (_Fagus sylvatica_) is readily recognised during winter and early spring by its smooth, thin, olive-grey bark, and its long tapering, pointed, brown buds. The expanding buds have already been mentioned (p. 44) as of special interest as regards the fan-like folding of the young leaves, and the arrangement for preventing undue loss of moisture while the epidermis is as yet very thin and permeable. The leaves of this tree are ovate, smooth and glossy, with strongly-marked parallel veins branching from the midrib. When young they are very silky, but later the fine, silky hairs are seen only on the slightly-toothed margin, and even these disappear as the season advances. The flowers are imperfect, and appear in April or early May. The staminate catkins are of a dark purple-brown colour, rounded and pendulous, with from eight to forty slender stamens having exposed, yellow anthers. The pistillate flowers are grouped in little clusters of from two to four, each one having three stigmas, and being surrounded by a four-lobed prickly cupule which afterwards forms a closed case. The fruits are three-cornered nuts, enclosed in the hardened cupules which split longitudinally, when ripe, into four valves that are lined with soft, silky hairs. The Hornbeam (_Carpinus Betulus_) is a much smaller tree, more or less abundant in the damp, clayey woods of the South. Its bark is smooth or slightly furrowed, of a light greyish colour, and its leaves are elliptical-ovate, with a doubly-serrate margin and acute point. The arrangement of the principal veins is the same as that of the Beech, and the young leaves are similarly plaited in the bud, but the expanded leaves are broader at the base than those of the Beech, are rougher, and are permanently hairy on the under surface. As with the Beech, the leaves assume very pleasing tints in the autumn, turning first yellow, and then through shades of orange to brown; and, in sheltered woods, many of them remain on the tree throughout the winter. The flowers appear in May and early June, and are imperfect, male and female flowers being in separate catkins, but on the same tree. The staminate catkins are pendulous and leafy, each flower having oval, acute bracts, and from three to twelve stamens with forked filaments and hairy anthers. The pistillate flowers are in erect catkins and are arranged in pairs. Their outer bracts are shed early, but the inner bracts or _bracteoles_, which are three-lobed, grow very large as the fruits ripen, at which time, also, the whole catkin becomes pendulous. Each flower has a two-chambered ovary, and two styles; but only one cell develops, and thus the fruits, each with only one seed, lie on the bases of the leafy bracteoles which aid in their dispersion by the wind.