AGAVE. 



245 



already brown and dead, towering like candelabra above 

 the withering plants. In a remarkably short space of 

 time one of these flower stems will grow from five to 

 seven yards in height, and display its yellow sweet- 

 scented flowers, whose number may exceed four thousand. 

 The idea that an Agave must be a hundred years old 

 to flower is only true in a limited sense. On tine 

 Riviera a period of from ten to fifteen years must elapse 

 before it is able to do this. The specimens in our con- 

 servatories, on the contrary, often wait fiftv years and 

 even longer for this moment. There is a plant closely 

 allied to the Agave, tlie Fourcro\<a longaeva, which 

 according to the Mexicans tiowers only once in four 

 hundred years. It grows in the highlands of Oaxaca, 

 in Mexico, and there attains a height of nearh' sixt^' 

 feet before it puts forth its inflorescence. This then 

 shoots up fort\-h\e tept 

 high and pro- 

 duces 



more " "^ 



than a mil- 

 lion and a hall 

 blossoms. The 

 Fourcro\'as in the garden 

 of La Aiortola furnish an 

 example ot this wondeitul 

 luxuriance. 



The sudden appearance 

 of the inflorescence of the 





Agave and its rapid development ynmj,erus Oxycidms. 



