Genus BUXUS, Tourn. 
Euphorbiaceae. Moncecia Tetrandria. 
S y 8t - Nat - Syst. Lin. 
Synonymes. 
Buxus, Of Authors. 
Buis, France. 
Buchsbaum, Germany. 
Bossolo, Bussolo, Italy. 
Buxo, Portugal. 
Box, Britain, Spain, and Anglo- America. 
Derivations. The word Buxus and its derivatives, come from the Greek puknos, close or firm ; in reference to the hardness 
and closeness of the wood of the box-tree. 
Generic Characters. Flowers in axillary groups ; unisexual in effect, but the male flowers have a rudi- 
ment of a pistil ; those of both sexes borne on one plant. Calyx of male flowers with 4 minute 1< 
Stamens 4, inserted under the rudiment of a pistil. Female flowers singly, at the tip of groups of male 
ones. Calyx as in the male. Ovary sessile, roundish, of 3 cells, and 2 ovules in each cell. Styles 3. 
Stigmas 3. Fruit a regma, leathery, beaked with the styles ; consisting of 3 incomplete cells, that 
open down the centre, and divide the style, and of 3 valves that bear the incomplete dissepiments in 
their centres. Seeds 2 in a cell, pendulous, both enclosed in the endocarpial lining of the cell, which, 
after the seed is ripe, disparts elastically, to admit of, and conduce to, their dispersion. Nees Von Estn- 
beck, Genera. 
;HE genus Buxus embraces low evergreen trees or shrubs, with 
shining coriaceous leaves, and greenish-yellow flowers; natives of 
Europe, and the temperate parts of Asia ; of easy culture in any 
soil that is tolerably dry; and propagated freely from cuttings, or 
by seeds. There are two species indigenous to Europe, namely, 
Buxus sempcrvirens, and balearica, the latter of which is a native 
of the Balearic Islands, where, according to the " Nouveau Du Hamel," it some- 
times grows to the height of eighty feet. It is also found in great abundance on all 
rocky surfaces both of Europe and Asiatic Turkey. It forms a very handsome 
tree, with a straight, smooth trunk. Its leaves, which are three times as large 
as those of the Buxus sempervirens, when fully exposed to the air, are of a much 
paler green than that species ; but when they are grown in the shade, they are of an 
intensely deep-green. The wood, which is of a brighter yellow colour than that 
of the common box, is imported into Europe and America, from ( Jonstantinople, for 
the use of wood-engravers; but its grain is coarser, and less compact, and conse- 
quently of less value. It has been asserted that the honey of Corsica is rendered 
poisonous from the bees feeding on the flowers of this tree. 
To the same natural order belongs the celebrated tallow-t i.e. (Stillingia sebi- 
fera,) a native of China, and introduced into Carolina, in \1~<i. together with the 
upland rice, by Mr. John Bradley Blake, of ('anion. The seeds, which were 
planted by Dr. Alexander Garden, of Charleston, flourished, and from that source 
were obtained all the trees of this description now growing in the southern stales 
of the union. An oil may be expressed from the kernels oi the fruit, winch 
hardens by cold, to the consistence of common tallow, and by boiling, becomes 
as hard as bees'-wax. 
