294 ODOROGRAPHIA. 



flowers blueish-white to blue ; berry black, the size of a pea. 

 When growing near the sea it has almost always 3-foliolate entire 

 leaves, the leaflets being attenuated into the petioles ; inland, the 

 shrub has a more delicate appearance, the petioles of the leaves 

 are much longer, and the leaflets, from 3 to 5 in number, are often 

 serrated. The serrated variety is preferred for medicinal uses. 

 The leaves of both varieties appear to be equally aromatic (the 

 odour, as before mentioned, reminding of Myrica Gale. The berry 

 is feebly aromatic. The leaves contain principally an essential oil 

 and a resin. According to Dymock, the oil possesses the same 

 odour as the leaves, is neutral and almost colourless. The resin 

 dissolves in alkaline solutions, with a reddish-brown colour, softens 

 below 40^ C, and gives off aromatic vapours when heated. 



Myrica cerifera. 



The " Candleberry, Bayberry or Wax-myrtle " of ^orth America 

 is the Myrica cerifera, a branching shrub of 4 to 8 feet high, — 

 sometimes higher, — with greyish bark, oblong or obovate-lanceolate, 

 entire, or sinutely toothed, exstipulate leaves and scattered male 

 catkins. This shrub abounds in Louisiana and I^ew Brunswick 

 and is widely disseminated in dry woods and open fields from ISTova 

 Scotia to Florida. It is also found in the Bahama Islands and is 

 cultivated in Cape Colony. 



The fruit is small (smaller than that of Black Pepper), dry and 

 juiceless, consisting of a globular woody stone enclosing one kernel. 

 The black granulations of the outer skin of the berry are covered 

 with a pure white mealy crust of wax. 



Of the Xorth American species, Myrica Carolinensis and M. 

 Pensylvanica are considered the most valuable. 



The best method of collecting the wax is to scald the berries 

 with boiling rain water, covering them to the depth of several 

 inches, and after a few minutes pouring off the liquid into another 

 vessel and skimming the wax at once from the surface. This is 

 the exterior coating only of the wax, and is of a yellow colour. 

 The marc is then to be boiled to extract the wax remaining in the 

 pulp, which is skimmed off in the same way, this is of a green 

 colour and much less balsamic in odour than the first portion. 



