[Carpinus.[I] Nat. Ord.—AmentiferÆ; Linn.—Monoec. Polyan.]

The Common Hornbeam, C. betulus, is a native of England and Ireland, and of the south of Scotland, and is also indigenous throughout the greater part of Europe and western Asia, but not in Africa. Picturesquely considered, the Hornbeam is very nearly allied to the beech. When suffered to grow it will be like it, and attain to a great height, with a fine straight trunk; it is very common in many parts of England, but is rarely allowed to become a timber-tree, being generally pollarded by the country people. It is, therefore, usually seen only in clipped hedges, where it is very obedient to the knife, and, with a little care, will never presume to appear out of form. It is excellent for forming tall hedges, or screens, in nursery grounds or ornamental gardens. That admirable espalier hedge in the long middle walk of Luxemburg garden at Paris (than which there is nothing more graceful), is planted of this tree; and so is that cradle, or close walk, with that perplexed canopy which covers the seat in her Majesty's garden at Hampton Court; these hedges are tonsile, but where they are maintained to fifteen or twenty feet in height (which is very frequent in the places before mentioned), they are to be cut and kept in order with a scythe of four feet long, and very little falcated; this is fixed on a long sneed, or straight handle, and does wonderfully expedite the trimming of these and the like hedges.

The leaves of the Hornbeam somewhat resemble those of the elm, but are smoother; they are cordate, doubly serrate, pointed, plaited when young, and have numerous parallel, transverse, hairy ribs; their colour is a darkish green, changing to a russet brown in autumn, and they remain on the tree, like those of the beech, till spring. The buds are rather long and pointed. The flowers appear at the same time as the leaves. The male catkins are loose, scaly, of a yellowish colour, and about two or three inches long; the female catkins are much smaller, and, when young, are covered with close brownish scales, which gradually increase, and form unequally three-lobed, sharply serrated, veiny, dry, pale-green bracts, each enveloping an angular nut, scarcely bigger than a grain of barley. These nuts ripen in October, and fall with the capsules. The bark of the Hornbeam is light-gray and smooth, and the wood very white, tough, and strong. It is used for yokes, handles for tools, and cogs for mill-wheels; it is also much valued by the turner. It is very inflammable, and will burn like a candle, for which purpose it was formerly employed. The inner bark is much used in the north of Europe for dyeing yellow.

When raised from seed, the common Hornbeam acquires the usual magnitude of the beech, to which, as before stated, it is similar in its appearance. In the neighbourhood of London the rate of growth may be considered from twelve to eighteen inches a-year for the first ten years, and the tree will attain its full size in between fifty and sixty years; its longevity may be considered as equal to that of the beech. Hanbury says that this tree is peculiarly grateful to hares and rabbits; and if so, the planting of it among other trees and shrubs might be the means of saving them from being injured by these creatures. The Hornbeam preserves itself from the butting of the deer, by its mode of throwing out its branches; on this account it should be cultivated in parks, as well as for its beauty and shelter. The regular growth of the Hornbeam is referred to by Fawkes, in his Bramham Park:

Here spiry firs extend their lengthened ranks,
There violets blossom on the sunny banks;
Here Hornbeam hedges regularly grow,
There hawthorn whitens and wild roses blow.

The Hornbeam is recommended to be planted on cold, barren hills, as in such situations it will flourish where few other trees will grow; it also resists the winds much better than the generality of trees, and, at the same time, it is not slow of growth. In such situations, Dr. Hunter observes that he noticed some specimens nearly seventy feet high, having large, noble stems, perfectly straight and sound.

There was a fine specimen of this tree at Bargoly, in Galloway, which measured, in 1780, six feet two inches in circumference. It had twenty feet of clear trunk, and was seventy feet high.