120 THE FRUITS OF THE COUNTRY-SIDE 



stamlnate flowers are in small compact catkins, having two 

 anthers on the inside of each scale, and these discharge an 

 abundance of sulphur-coloured pollen. These catkins 

 are from half an inch to an inch long. The pistillate 

 flowers are in short many-flowered cones. These cones 

 are covered with closely imbricated scales ^ that presently 

 dry and harden until they become woody. Each of 

 these scales, except a few of the lowest, covers and protects 

 two winged seeds at its base, the wings being some two 

 or three times as long as the seeds, and aiding in their 

 distribution. The cones are green or purplish-green at 

 first, but by July they attain their full size and become 

 brown in colour ; these remain on the tree for a consider- 

 able time, though the seeds are discharged from them in the 

 following Spring. These cones, when they do eventually 

 fall, remain, like the leaves, long unchanged on the ground ; 

 if collected they make very good firing material. The 

 flowering stage is in May and June, but the fruit does 

 not mature until July twelvemonth. In our drawing it 

 will be observed that one cone is small, immature, closed ; 

 another is larger and preparing to open ; while the third, 

 and lowest, shows the woody scales fully expanded and the 

 seeds dispersed. 



The Scotch pine had a goodlier string of " vertues " 

 attached to it by the old herbalists than its sombre foliage, 

 rugged bark, and woody cones would quite suggest. We 

 see, for instance, that " if at any time any one should 

 wittingly or unwittingly take Henbane and be distempered 



' We have striven to avoid the use, as far as may be, of technical terms, 

 but this one, " imbricated," describes the matter so entirely that we are 

 constrained to use it. It is from the Latin imbrex, a tile, and exactly brings 

 before us the picture of the scales all overlapping, like tiles on a roof. 



