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A tree, attaining exceptionally a height of 80 feet, but more generally only reaching 40 or 50 feet. Bark smooth and grey at first, but after fifteen or twenty years of age scaling off in thin plates, and ultimately becoming fissured. Leaves long-stalked, broadly oval, nearly as broad as long, with a cordate or truncate base and an acute apex; with 6-10 triangular acuminate serrate lobes; shining and glabrous above, obscurely pubescent beneath; nerves pinnate, 5-8 pairs. Flowers white in corymbs. Styles 2, glabrous, united for the greater part of their length. Fruit ovoid, brownish when ripe, with warty lenticels, vinous in taste when in a state of incipient decay; cut across transversely it shows a ring of white hardened tissue, forming a mesocarp around the core.

The leaves are generally described as glabrous on the under surface, but in all specimens traces of pubescence may be observed, which is much more marked on coppice shoots and epicormic branches.

None have been obtained in cultivation so far as we know, and wild trees vary very little in any of their characters. A variety, pinnatifida, with the lobing of the leaves very deep, is described by Boissier, from specimens occurring in Asia Minor and Roumelia.

The leaves in summer are unmistakable (see Plate 44), and can only be confounded with certain forms of Pyrus latifolia; but in the latter species the under surface of the leaf is always plainly grey tomentose, and the lobes are much shorter than in P. torminalis. In winter the following characters, shown in Plate 45, are available.

Twigs: long shoots, glabrous, shining, somewhat angled, with numerous lenticels; leaf-scar semicircular with 3 bundle traces, set parallel to the twig on a greenish cushion. Buds almost globular, terminal larger, side-buds nearly appressed to the twig; scales green with a narrow brown margin, glabrous, with the apex double-notched. Short shoots slightly ringed, glabrous, ending in a terminal bud.