AMENTIFER/E. 181 



" ' One day,' quotli ho, ' I sate, as was my trade, 

 Under the foot of Mole, that mountain hoar, 

 Keeping my sheep among the cooly shade 

 Of the green alders on the Mulla's shore.' " 



Browne, another old English poet, alludes to the alder not injuring the grass that 

 grows beneath it : — 



" The alder, whose fat shadow nourisheth 

 Each plant set neerc to him, long flourisheth," 



We have already said that the alder is found to attain the greatest perfection in 

 damp moist lands, and no tree is so well adapted for upholding the banks of riv^ers, 

 from the great multiplicity of its roots. It will not even live on a dry chalky soil. 



GENUS VII.—B E T U L A. Toumef. 



Male flowers in C34indrical catkins with peltate catkin-scales, each 

 catkin-scale accompanied by 2 floral-scales, and covering 3 flowers: 

 stamens 4, attached to the catkin-scale ; filaments very short, combined 

 at the base; anthers 1 -celled. Female catkins oblong- cylmdrical, with 

 the catkin-scales 3-lobed at the apex, and covering 3 flowers; floral- 

 scales or perianth none : ovary sessile, 2-celled, with 1 ovule in each 

 cell; styles 2, elongate-filiform, stigmatiferous throughout. Fruit 

 catkins with rather small deciduous scarious catkin-scales, the 2 lateral 

 lobes of each scale spreading. Fruit a minute nut, 2-celled and 2-seeded 

 or 1-celled and 1 -seeded by abortion of the middle cell, surrounded by 

 broad membranous marginal wings. Cotyledons filling the cavity of 

 the seed, flattish, oblong. 



Trees or shrubs with roundish or rhomboidal or triangular serrate 

 or lobed leaves. Male catkins generally in pairs, produced in autumn, 

 and remaining naked during the winter ; female catkins solitary, ap- 

 pearing with or shortly after the leaves. 



According to Dr. Mayne, the origin of the name of this genus of plants is from 

 bat no, I beat or strike ; because of it were formed the fasces borne before the 

 magistrates by the lictors of Rome. 



SPECIES I.— B E T U L A ALBA. Linn. 

 Plates MCCXCV. MCCXCVI. 



Leaves conspicuously stalked, deltoid- or rhomboidal-ovate, acutfe 

 or acuminate, doubly serrated. Catkin-scales of the female catkm 

 3-lobe(l, the sinus between the lobes extendhig less than half-way 

 down. Fruit with a wing broader than the seed-bearing part, which 

 is oval or oval-obovate. 



