252 MYRTACEAE. 
Myrtus. Myrtle. 
(Family Myrtaceae). 
Aromatic shrub: evergreen. 
Twigs slender, terete: pith very 
minute, somewhat spongy. Buds 
sessile, solitary, small, ovoid, ap- 
pressed, with 1 or 2 pairs of ex- 
posed gray-hairy scales. Leaf- 
scars opposite, minute, raised: 
bundle-trace 1: stipule-scars lack- 
ing. Leaves small, lanceolate, 
very acute at both ends, entire, 
pellucid-dotted. 
Myrtle, like the rather similar 
laurel, was used in an emblema- 
tic way by the Greeks, with whom 
it was a particular badge of judi- 
cial authority. 
To an inexpert person, ,myrtle 
is rather like box in its general 
effect, and in Azorean gardens a 
similar suggestion is found in the 
quite unrelated genus Myrsine. 
The name running myrtle is sometimes given to the peri- 
winkle, Vinca minor, for a 
like reason. 
Twigs puberulent, with flaking cortex. M. communis. 
