TAXUS. 



125 



flowers sessile, composed of numerous imbricated scales 

 of which the upper one only bears an erect ovule. 



Fruit a brownish oval nut enveloped in a glutinous aril open at 

 the apex and maturing the first season. 



More than one eminent botanist has expressed his opinion that 

 Taxus is a monotypic genus and that the local forms occurring in 

 Florida and Japan, and the more widely distributed ones in Canada 

 and north- west America are but geographical varieties of the 

 common Yew which have in the course of ages, under the influence 

 of climate and environment, become differentiated in habit and foliage 

 from the European type. It is, however, more convenient to- 

 describe these geographical offshoots separately as sub-species. A fifth 

 geographical form has been described by Schlechtendal* under the 

 name of Taxus globosa from specimens gathered by Ehrenberg in 



south Mexico ; but as nothing more 

 is known of it, it is here purposely 

 omitted. 



With the exception of the Mexican 

 form the Yew is not met with in a 

 wild state beyond the limits of the- 

 temperate zone of the northern hemis- 

 phere. Preferring elevated situations it 

 nowhere forms a continuous forest, and 

 even where plentiful it is mixed with 

 other trees. On the continent of Europe 

 it is more or less common in. all the- 

 mountainous and hilly districts from the- 

 Mediterranean to Sweden and Norway, 

 as far as 61 north latitude, ascending- 

 to 3,500 4,000 feet on the Alps and 

 Apennines, 4,000 5,000 feet on the- 

 Pyrenees, and 5,0006,000 feet on the 

 mountains in the south of Spain. It is- 

 also found in Algeria on the Atlas- 

 range, on the Cilician Taurus in Asia 

 Minor, in Armenia, Persia and as far 

 eastwards as the Amur region. On the 

 Himalaya its vertical limits are 6,000 

 11,000 feet and it spreads eastwards 

 from Katiristan and Kashmir to Assam and the Khasia Hills. 



The Yew is of geological antiquity ; it first appeared in early 

 Tertiary times, and in the Miocene period it formed an ingredient of 

 the forests of Great Britain, and has continued to inhabit these islands 

 ever since. It is found among the buried trees on the Norfolk 

 coast near Cromer ; it also crops up in another forest now in part 

 buried beneath the Bristol Channel in which, if there be any truth 

 in bones, the elephant, rhinoceros and beaver once roamed, f 



Fig. 51. Fructification of the common 

 Yew. 1, Staminate. 2, Ovuliferous 

 flower. 3, Ripe fruit. 4, Longitudinal 

 section of the seed showing the position 

 of the embryo. 



* Limirea, XII. 496. 

 f Ramsay, Physical Geology of Great Britain, 



