CORYLUS AMERICANA (Walters). Common hazel bush.--Leaves roundish, heart-shaped, pointed, coarsely serrate; husk somewhat downy, with a wide, flattened, fringed border extending beyond the roundish nut. Shell rather thick and brittle; kernel sweet and good, but the nut is too small to be considered of much value. A low shrub, with many stems springing from the roots. Young shoots and twigs downy and glandular-hairy. Common in woods and old fields from Canada to Florida. CORYLUS ROSTRATA (Aiton). Beaked hazel.--Leaves ovate or oblong, somewhat heart-shaped, pointed, doubly serrate; husk extending an inch or more beyond the round or ovoid nut, forming before it opens a long tubular beak, hence the name. The husk is densely covered with nettle-like bristles, which are quite irritating to tender hands. The nuts are small, usually growing in clusters at the ends of the twigs, only a few coming to maturity. A low shrub or small tree, usually growing in a dense clump, not spreading from subterranean stems, as in the last species. Common on rather firm and rich soil along the borders of streams, in the northern border States, and southward on the Alleghanies, but most abundant in the north through Canada, and westward to the Pacific in Washington and Oregon, where, in the mountains, it often assumes the tree form, growing to a hight of twenty-five to thirty feet, with a stem from four to six inches in diameter. The wood is light, soft, and very white to the center. It also extends southward to central California, but here it is only a small bush, this form having been described under the name of _Corylus rostrata_, var. Californica, A. de C. This species probably reaches its highest development in the Cascade range, in northern Oregon. The same or a closely allied species of the hazel extends far into northern Asia. There are no improved varieties of either of our native species of the hazel in cultivation. EUROPEAN SPECIES OF CORYLUS. [Illustration: FIG. 39. CONSTANTINOPLE HAZEL.] CORYLUS AVELLANA (Linn.). Common hazelnut.--Leaves roundish, heart-shaped, pointed, coarsely and unevenly serrate; husk bell-shaped, spreading, with a fringed or deeply cut margin. The original form of this nut is supposed to have been ovate or oval, but with a plant indigenous to such a wide range of climate and country, and one that has been so long under cultivation,--running wild in many localities where it is not a native,--it would be very difficult at this time to determine its primary botanical characters. A common shrub or small tree throughout the greater part of Europe and Asia.