148 FAMILIAR TREES 



the five bi-lobed crenulations of the disc, the capsule 

 tapers gradually, like a pyramid, from base to apex, 

 and the tufts of hair of the seeds do not quite reach to 

 the apex of the capsule. This species, which reaches 

 from ten to thirty feet in height, is that which Pena 

 and Lobel described in their "Adversaria" (1570), 

 as Tamaris'cus narhonen'sis, and which Linnseus 

 named Tamarix gal'lica. The other species is that 

 which grows along the western and northern coasts 

 of France, from Bordeaux to the Seine, and in 

 England, for which reason Webb distinguished it as 

 T. anglica. This seldom exceeds ten feet in height. 

 Its five stamens are united below in the disc, spring- 

 ing directly from the points of its five lobes; the 

 capsule is flask-shaped ; and the tufts of hair on the 

 seeds are distinctly shorter than the capsule. In 

 both forms the ovary is one-chambered, but is 

 triangular externally and is surmounted by three re- 

 curved stigmas ; its ovules are arranged in three rows. 

 Common on the shores of the Mediterranean, the 

 Tamarisk was undoubtedly known to the early Greek 

 botanists. Pliny says that it is the Myri'ca of Dios- 

 corides; but what the origin of the existing name 

 may be is uncertain. It has been derived from 

 the Hebrew tamarik, cleansing, from its use either 

 for purifying the blood or for making brooms; but 

 another etymology is from the river Tamaris, now 

 the Tambro, in the Pyrenees, on whose banks it 

 grows. William Turner in his " Names of Herbes " 

 (1548) writes of it: — 



"Myrica, otherwyee named tamarix, and of the Herbavies Taraar- 

 isous, is named in duche tamariske, in frenche tameris. I dyd never 



