1560 The Trees of Great Britain and Ireland 



11. Pyrus salicifolia, Pallas, Itin. iii. 734 (1736). 



A tree, often spiny, about 30 ft. high. Branchlets grey tomentose. Buds 

 with brown ciliate scales, usually glabrous on the surface. Leaves, 2 to 3 in. 

 long, averaging \ in. broad, linear-lanceolate, very tapering at both ends, and 

 often prolonged at the apex into a sharp point ; entire in margin ; covered 

 slightly on the upper surface and densely on the lower surface with a white 

 silky appressed tomentum ; petioles short, tomentose. Fruit turbinate, about 

 I inch in diameter, with a persistent calyx. 



A native of the Crimea, Caucasus, and Armenia. Introduced in 1780, and 

 often planted as an ornamental tree, on account of its whitish foliage, which at a 

 distance resembles that of Salix alba. 



P. canescens, 1 Spach, Hist. Veg. ii. 129 (1834), judging from a tree at Kew, 

 about 30 ft. high, obtained from Decaisne in 1875, is possibly a hybrid of 

 P. salicifolia. It has lanceolate or narrowly elliptic leaves, about 2^ in. long, 

 acute or mucronate at the apex, minutely crenulate, often twisted, and 

 resembling in tomentum those of P. salicifolia. The buds are also like those of 

 the latter species. (A. H.) 



PYRUS COMMUNIS, Common Pear 



Pyrus communis, Linnaeus, Sp. PL 459 (1753); Loudon, Arb. et Prut. Brit. ii. 880 (1838); 

 Willkomm, Forstliche Flora, 843 (1887); Mathieu, Flore Forestiere, 167 (1897); Schneider, 

 Laubholzkunde, i. 661 (1906); Ascherson and Graebner, Syn. Mitteleurop. Flora, vi. pt. 2, 

 p. 60 (1906). 



A tree or shrub, with numerous short shoots or spurs, which often end in 

 thorny points. Bark smooth at first, ultimately broken on the surface into small 

 scales. Young branchlets glabrous. Leaves, scattered on the long shoots, clustered 

 on the short shoots, variable in size and shape, usually ovate or oval, rounded or 

 subcordate at the base, acute or shortly acuminate at the apex ; minutely crenate 

 in margin except occasionally near the base ; slightly tomentose when young, 

 nearly quite glabrous in summer, dark green and shining above, paler beneath ; 

 petiole slender, nearly as long as or even exceeding the blade in length. In winter 

 the buds are ovoid, pointed, shining brown, with a few glabrous ciliate scales ; 

 lateral buds, nearly as large as the terminal bud, either appressed or slightly 

 diverging from the twig ; leaf-scars crescentic, three-dotted. 



Flowers, six to twelve in a leafy corymb, the axis of which, together with the 

 pedicels, and external surface of the calyx-tube and sepals, is more or less covered 

 with greyish tomentum ; inner surface of the sepals with a dense rusty tomentum ; 

 petals white, with a short claw ; styles five, free, almost as long as the fifteen to 

 twenty stamens. Fruit turbinate, narrowing gradually towards the thickened 

 stalk, crowned by the persistent calyx. 



1 P. canescens, Decaisne, Jardin Fruitier, t. 19 (1 871) does not appear to agree with Spach's description. 



