TAMARISK 183 



flourishing on sandy stretches, where it affords some shelter from the 

 bleak east wind. It has served, moreover, with the native Sea Buck- 

 thorn, apart from Marram Grass and Sand Sedge, to bind together 

 the otherwise shifting sands of the east coast. 



So called from its native place in Spain, Tamaris, the Tamarisk is 

 an evergreen shrub which is planted on account of its predilection for 

 the sea. It is woody, erect, and possesses slender, feathery branches, 

 with threadlike or awl-shaped leaves below, triangular, with earlike 

 lobes above, overlapping, and small. 



The flowers are pink, in spikes, which are lateral, close, alternate, 

 slender, and with broad arrow-shaped bracts or leaflike organs below. 

 The sepals and petals are five in number, the lateral ones do not fall, 

 and all are united at the base, with apiculate anthers. The capsule, 

 which is globular, 3-sided, is narrower at the top, and contains nume- 

 rous feathered seeds, the hairs being lateral and terminal. 



The Tamarisk is sometimes 12 ft. in height. The flowers bloom 

 from May to October. It is a perennial shrub. 



The flowers, though small, are rather conspicuous as a whole. 

 This is one of those maritime plants which, though they flower late, 

 are not attractive to insects, and have thus to rely on self-pollination 

 very largely. The anthers are capable of moving when they are about 

 to discharge pollen. There are several carpels and many stamens. 



The Tamarisk is dispersed by the agency of the wind, and the seed 

 is provided with a tuft of hairs which render it fit for wind dispersal. 



Requiring a saline soil, it is a salt-lover, and is also a sand-loving 

 plant, living on a sand soil. 



No fungi or insects infest the Tamarisk, so far as is known. 



Tamarix, Pliny, is the Latin name of the plant, and gallica refers 

 to its French derivation (in our case). 



The Tamarisk is called Cypress, Heath, Ling, and Tamarisk. 

 Turner, in his Names of Herbes, says it was once called Heath: "the 

 Schole maisters in Englande have a long time called myrica (Tamarix) 

 heath, or lyng, but so longe have been deceyved altogether ". 



In Sicily they believed it was the tree upon which Judas hanged 

 himself. It is cultivated as a hedge plant, and much used for this 

 purpose along the coast, where nothing else will grow. 



ESSENTIAL SPECIFIC CHARACTERS: 



60. Tamarix gallica, L. Shrubby, branches slender, leafy, flexible, 

 leaves scale-like, glabrous, appressed, minute, flowers pink or rose in 

 a panicle, capsule rounded, truncate. 



