five to ten, surrounded by dark-coloured sweet pulp, ovoid, ¾ inch long, and covered by a hard dark brown shell.
In the young leaf[1] of Gymnocladus canadensis, the rachis is prolonged an inch or more above the insertion of the upper pinnæ; and the axes of the pinnæ are similarly prolonged beyond the leaflets. These terminal appendages are very slender and tendril-like, and disappear before the leaf attains its full size. They have been supposed to be rudimentary tendrils, such as occur normally in a developed state in many leguminous plants; but they may represent simply degenerate terminal leaflets.
Sargent states that this species is diœcious; and that in order to obtain fruit male and female trees must be close together. C.M. Hovey,[2] however, writing from Boston, states that he knows a solitary tree, no other being within two miles, which produces fruit and fertile seeds, from which he has raised many plants. The so-called pistillate flowers have stamens, which doubtless are usually not fully developed; but it is possible that in some cases they may produce good pollen.
The flowers[3] in America are visited by bees, which are attracted by the nectar secreted by the inner wall of the calyx tube.
Identification
In summer the foliage of the tree is unmistakable. In winter the fewness of the branches and the stoutness of the branchlets, which are very short in adult trees, are remarkable. The latter show the following characters:—
Twigs coarse, grey, glabrous, with numerous small brown lenticels and wide, circular, orange-coloured pith. Leaf-scars large, obcordate, slightly oblique on prominent pulvini, with a narrow raised yellowish margin and a whitish convex surface, marked by three to five irregular tubercles, which are the scars of the vascular bundles. Buds very small; two to three vertically superposed, in the axil of each leaf-scar, the lower one rarely developing; projecting slightly out of circular depressions in the bark, which form pubescent rings around the buds. Each bud shows two to three minute scales, which become accrescent and green in the spring at the base of the shoots. No true terminal bud is developed, the tip of the branchlet falling off in summer and leaving at the apex of the twig a circular scar.
Distribution
The Kentucky Coffee tree, though occupying a wide area in North America, is nowhere common. It is found scattered amongst other trees on hillsides where the soil is rich, and in alluvial land beside rivers. It is met with in central
