Fraxinus 883 



FRAXINUS SYRIACA 



Fraxinus syriaca,^ Boissier, Diag. Ser. I. ii. p. 77 (1849). 



Fraxinus oxyphylla, M. Bieberstein, var. oligophylla, Boissier, Fl. Orient, iv. 40 (1879). 



A tree attaining 60 feet in height. Shoots glabrous, green, stout, conspicuously 

 marked by very prominent leaf-bases; lenticels white. Leaves (Plate 263, Fig. 10), 

 small, always in whorls of threes or fours. Leaflets usually three, occasionally five 

 to seven on some of the branchlets, sessile, lanceolate to ovate, base cuneate, apex 

 acuminate, sharply and coarsely serrate, the serrations with incurved points, glabrous 

 on both surfaces. Rachis of the leaf narrowly winged, the wings not meeting 

 above, but forming an open groove. 



Flowers (section Fraxinaster) in short racemes in the axils of the leaf-scars of 

 the preceding year's shoot ; without calyx or corolla. Fruit ovate-oblong ; apex 

 rounded, truncate or acuminate, ending in a mucro. 



This species occurs in Syria, Kurdistan, Persia, Baluchistan, and Afghanistan. 



The occurrence always of the leaves in whorls, a phenomenon met with in 

 individual instances in other species, appears to be constant in this species. On 

 strong shoots leaves with five to seven leaflets exceptionally appear ; those with 

 three leaflets, however, being by far the most common. Small specimens of this 

 tree are growing at Kew, but it does not seem likely to be worth growing in 

 England. (A. H.) 



FRAXINUS ELONZA 



Fraxinus Elonza, Dippel, Latcbholzkunde, i. 87, fig. 46 (1889); Koehne, Deutsche Dendrologie, 513 

 (1893). 



A small tree. Branchlets green, glabrous ; lenticels few, oval, white. Buds 

 laterally compressed and not quadrangular, narrowed and rounded at the apex ; 

 external scales four, densely brown pubescent, inner pair longer than the outer pair. 

 Leaflets (Plate 266, Fig. 27), eleven to thirteen, i to 2\ inches long, sessile, oval 

 or lanceolate, with unequal base and acuminate apex, sharply and irregularly serrate, 

 some of the serrations being often triangular and spreading ; under surface pubescent 

 near the base with brown tomentum, often occurring only on the inner side of the 

 midrib. Leaf-rachis, with scattered pubescence, densest at the nodes ; strongly 

 winged, the wings meeting above in part of their length. Fruit described as broadly 

 linear, with almost parallel sides, truncate and emarginate at the apex. 



The native country of this species is unknown ; and it is possibly a hybrid, as 



* Fraxinu! sogdiana, Bunge, Mint. Sav. Strang. Acad. Pitersbourg, vii. 390 (1851), occurring in Turkestan, formerly 

 supposed to be identical with this species, is considered distinct by Koehne in Gartenflora, 1 899, p. 288, and by Lingelsheim, 

 in Engler, Bot.Jahrb. xl. 222 (1907). 



