MISTLETOE : BOX 



143 



Apple, &c. are commonest, Oak rarest. The plant is 

 unmistakeable, especially when bearing the greenish white 

 berries. The shoot usually ends in a flower-bud, flanked 

 on either side by a leaf-bud composed of two outer leaves 

 flattened face to face and enclosing about two pairs of 

 decussate leaf-incepts, and with a minute scale at the 

 marginal base on each flank. In the axil of each of these 

 latter scales may be another similar bud. 



(ii) Non-parasitic shrubs with shining green 

 coriaceous leaves. 



(a) Buds very small; leaves rather small, 

 oval, dark green and hard. 



Buxus sempervirens, L. Box (Fig. 65). Twigs more 

 or less 4-angled. Old stems, often twisted, with thin 

 flaking dirty yellow bark. 



Fig. 65. Box, Buxus sempervirens (D). 



