44 SEA-SIDE PLANTS. 



Tamarisk (Tamarix cjallica). On many parts of 

 the British coast it is unknown as a wild plant, 

 but it is plentiful on the rocks, cliffs, and sandy 

 shores by the sea, about the Lizard and St. 

 Michael's, Cornwall ; and grows near Hurst 

 Castle, Hastings, at Sandgate in Kent, and on 

 several parts of the southern shores of England. 

 Its leaves are of a pale sea-green, and its young 

 twigs are red. The blossoms come upon this 

 shrub in July, and are most elegant feathery spikes 

 of pink flowers. Fuller says that the Tamarisk 

 was first brought from Switzerland into England 

 by Bishop Grindal, when he returned from the 

 exile into which he had been sent in the reign of 

 Queen Mary, and planted it in his garden in his 

 native land. It grows abundantly on the Tanaris, 

 now called the Tambra, on the Spanish side of the 

 Pyrenees, and hence the plant was named from 

 the Tamarisci, the people who inhabit these coun- 

 tries. Very pretty hedges of it grow luxuriantly 

 around Boulogne, on the French coast, and Sir 

 J, E. Smith observed there that the sheep so pre- 

 ferred its branches to any other herbage, that they 

 never touched another plant so long as its boughs 

 grew within their reach. It is one of the most 

 common productions of the Arabian desert, where 

 its green leaves afford a welcome, though slight 

 shadow, and the camels crop its graceful branches. 

 The Oriental Tamarisk is by pre-eminence the 

 tree of Egypt, for on its saline and sandy soils no 

 other tree rises which can give wood enough for 

 fuel or for furniture but this. They call it the 

 Atle, and the Egyptians have a proverb, that the 

 world would go ill with them if Atles were to fail. 

 Our French Tamarisk, when it attains any size, 



