Distribution. River swamps often inundated during a considerable part of the year from southeastern Virginia southward through the coast regions to the shores of Indian River and the valley of the Suwanee River, Florida, through the maritime portions of the Gulf states to the valley of the Brazos River, Texas, and northward through western Louisiana to southeastern Missouri, and to northeastern Louisiana, western Mississippi, and the valley of the lower Wabash River, Illinois; passing into the var. _australis_ Sarg. with narrower leaflets, smaller ellipsoidal fruit, pale red-brown nuts without longitudinal wrinkles, and with close not scaly bark of the trunk. A large tree in dry sandy soil; high banks of the St. John’s River, near San Mateo, Putnam County, near Jupiter, Palm Beach County, banks of the Caloosahatchie River at Alma, Lee County, and Old Town, Lafayette County, Florida; near Marshall, Harrison County, Texas. 5. Carya myristicæformis Nutt. Nutmeg Hickory. [Illustration: Fig. 173] Leaves 7′—14′ long, with slender terete scurfy-pubescent petioles, and 7—9, occasionally 5, ovate-lanceolate to broadly obovate acute leaflets usually equally or sometimes unequally cuneate or rounded at the narrow base, coarsely serrate, short-stalked or nearly sessile, thin and firm, dark green above, more or less pubescent or nearly glabrous and silvery white and very lustrous below, 4′—5′ long, 1′—1½′ wide, with a pale scurfy pubescent midrib; changing late in the season to bright golden-bronze color and then very conspicuous. Flowers: staminate in aments 3′—4′ long and coated like the ovate-oblong acute bract and calyx of the flower with dark brown scurfy pubescence; stamens 6, with yellow anthers; pistillate oblong, narrowed at the ends, slightly 4-angled, covered with thick brown scurfy pubescence. Fruit usually solitary, ellipsoidal or slightly obovoid, 4-ridged to the base, with broad thick ridges, 1½′ long, coated with yellow-brown scurfy pubescence, the husk not more than 1/32′ thick, splitting nearly to the base; nut ellipsoidal or sometimes slightly obovoid, 1′ long, ¾′ broad, rounded and apiculate at the ends, smooth, dark reddish brown, and marked by longitudinal broken bands of small gray spots covering the entire surface at the ends with a thick hard and bony shell, a thick partition, and a low thin dorsal division; seed sweet, small, dark brown; the lobes deeply 2-lobed at apex.