20 FAMILIAR TREES 



scales wrapped round the base of two green needle- 

 leaves, placed face to face, and as yet very short and. 

 slender. At the base of these twin needles there can 

 be detected between them the arrested apex of the 

 dwarf shoot that bears them. 



The needle-leaves vary much in length, according 

 to the age of the tree and the soil in which it grows, 

 the shortest being about four and the longest about 

 eight inches long. Their dark green colour on both 

 surfaces, their length, and their more crowded arrange- 

 ment, together with the pyramidal outline of the 

 whole tree, serve to distinguish it from the Scots 

 Fir. Semicircular in section, these needles are finely 

 striated with sixteen rows of stomata down their 

 convex surfaces and eight rows down the inner flat 

 surfaces. They have very finely toothed edges and 

 a blunt apex, and remain on for three or four years. 

 In section they exhibit a number of resin-ducts all 

 round the leaf, each surrounded by sclerenchyma, and 

 two vascular bundles in a wide central band of tissue. 



The staminate flowers are densely clustered near 

 the ends of the shoots and are of a pale 3-ellow colour. 

 Each flower is cylindrical and from an inch to an 

 inch and a half long, surrounded at its base by several 

 membranous bracts, and having its stamens arranged 

 spirally and each furnished with a rounded " con- 

 nective " or " crest." When the two anther-chambers 

 have split longitudinally they discharge an abund- 

 ance of pollen of a beautiful sulphur^ellow colour, 

 and the male catkins then drop off, leaving that part 

 of the young shoot to which they were attached 

 in a naked state, so that, as in the Cluster Pine and 



