532 OUR WOODLAND TREES. 
less tall garden shrub, it is fairly entitled to take 
rank as a Tree, growing in our woodlands often- 
times to a height of twenty or thirty feet, and—as 
we have seen it in the New Forest—with a girth of 
more than nine feet. When planted as a border, 
it makes a thicket untouched by insects, and im- 
penetrable even to birds. 
On old Trees the upper leaves of the Holly are 
often entire and unprovided with the spiny points 
which are so generally characteristic of the leaves 
of this species. But the spiny leaf of Ilex aqui- 
folium is a thing of beauty, whether we look at it 
glistening under the rays of the sun, sparkling 
with the added brilliancy of rain drops, or 
merely hold it in our hand to examine with more 
minuteness its form and colourmg. Specially 
shall we have occasion to admire it if we look at 
it as ‘only a leaf,’ and not when it is—in cluster- 
ing association with ten thousand of its com- 
panions—lighting up the dark recesses of some 
wood. Dark green above, lighter underneath, ob- 
long in shape, and curiously contorted—its edge 
bent and twisted into bays, furnished with pro- 
montories in the form of sharp spimes—these are 
