Winter-buds of medium size, conical or long-acuminate, reddish-brown; leaves large, broad-oval, ovate or obovate, with a long acuminate apex and cuneate or subcordate base; margins doubly crenate-serrate with teeth tipped with glands which disappear as the leaves mature; thin and firm in texture; upper surface light green, glabrous, the under surface paler, pubescent when young and pubescent at maturity on some soils; midribs coarse but veins rather slender; petioles two-thirds inch long, rather stout, with two, sometimes but one, large, dark red glands near the blade, pubescent and tinged with red; stipules lanceolate, sometimes lobed, one-half inch in length. Flowers expanding early, before or with the leaves, large, sometimes one and one-half inches across; borne in three or four-flowered lateral umbels on slender, glabrous, red pedicels one-half inch or more in length; calyx-tube obconic, outer surface red, inner surface pink; calyx-lobes glabrous on both surfaces or with a few, straight, scattered hairs on the inner surface, pinkish, acute, glandular; petals pink, turning a darker pink in fading, rather broadly ovate, apex rounded, base a short claw, margins erose; stamens with yellow anthers; filaments one-half inch long; pistils glabrous, shorter than the stamens. Fruit ripening comparatively early; globose or oval, usually somewhat oblong, an inch or more through the long diameter, red, orange or yellowish in color, with little or no bloom; skin thick, tough and astringent; flesh yellow, firm, meaty, often acid or astringent; stone usually clinging, large, oval, compressed, thick-walled, with a sharp ridge on the ventral and a slight groove on the dorsal suture. It is possible that a group of Nigras, those occurring in western Wisconsin and Minnesota and about the upper extremity of Lake Superior ought to be described as a sub-species since they have a somewhat different aspect of tree and the fruits are a darker shade of red and show more bloom; the calyx is more pubescent and the calyx-glands more sessile. The differences in environment may change these characters, as indicated above, but they seem very constant in the cultivated varieties of the groups, most of which come from the west, and therefore sufficient to segregate this form from the species.