152 WAYSIDE AND WOODLAND BLOSSOMS. 



The Scotch-pine, as with the reader's permission we will call 

 it, differs much according to the situation in which it is grow- 

 ing. In a favourable locality its trunk will grow to an altitude 

 of one hundred feet, with a girth of twelve feet, whereas in very 

 lofty, exposed situations it is a stunted shrub. Its bark is rugged, 

 and of a ruddy-brown colour. Its needle-shaped leaves are in 

 twos, and last for three years, after which they fall. The flowers 

 are of two kinds. The males consist of many two-celled anthers 

 spirally arranged on a spike, and the spikes are clustered round 

 the new shoots. The female flowers consist each of a green 

 scale, thickened and sticky at the apex and bearing on the inner 

 side of its base two naked ovules. These scales are also asso- 

 ciated in a spiral manner round a spike, the whole having a 

 conical form. The male flowers produce an enormous quantity 

 of pollen, which the wind blows in great sulphur-like clouds. 

 Some of the pollen-grains stick to the edges of the scales on 

 the young cones, and the pollen-shoots find their way down to 

 the ovules and fertilize them. In the ripe cone we find, on the 

 scales separating, there are two winged seeds under each scale 

 The timber of P. sylvestris is very valuable, and large quantities 

 of it are annually imported from Norway and the shores of the 

 Baltic ; there are numerous varieties of it, known commercially 

 as Red pine, Norway pine, Riga pine, Baltic pine, etc. The 

 tree begins to bear cones between the age of fifteen and twenty 

 years. 



It is characteristic of Pines that the branches die off early, 

 and this gives old trees the peculiar appearance of a tall, gaunt, 

 red mast, with a somewhat flat, spreading head. 



The Cluster Pine or Pinaster (P. pinaster}. 



This is not a native of Britain, though it has been grown 

 here for about three hundred years. Its home is in the coun- 

 tries bordering the Mediterranean, chiefly in low ground near 



