254 



DOMESTIC BOTANY. 



resting plants, and have long formed an important feature in 

 tlie Kew collection ; B. australis, B. compar, B. integrifolia, 

 B. Solandri, and B. serrata, attaining the height of from 15 

 to 20 feet, several being forty years old, while two plants of 

 B. repens are upwards of sixty years of age. 



A few years ago the Kew collection of Proteacege 

 amounted to 155 species. For many years plants of this 

 family were rare in this country, but forty-five years ago the 

 Clapton Nursery became, and continued for many years, 

 famed for its large stock of Australian Proteaceous plants ; 

 they were also plentiful in private collections of this 

 country, as well as on the Continent, but the taste for 

 show-llowers has caused them to be superseded, and now 

 proteaceous plants are rarely to be seen. 



In Australia the Banksias are called " Honeysuckle trees," 

 on account of the great quantity of honey contained in their 

 flowers, which is also the case with Protea mellifera^ and 

 others of the Cape of Good Hope. 



The Sarcocol Family. 



(Pen^ece^.) 



Small shrubs with opposite, distant or closely imbricate 

 short leaves. Flowers solitary or in terminal heads, red or 

 pale yellow. Calyx a shallow 4-lobed cup, with bracts at 

 its base. Stamens 4 or 8. Fruit a 4-celled capsule. 



This family consists of about 20 species, natives of South 

 Africa, the most interesting being Pencsa Sarcocolla^ which is 

 said to yield the gum sarcocol, but there is no evidence to 

 show that it produced the sarcocol of the ancients, which was 

 famed for healing wounds. 



THE SPURGEWOET ALLIANCE. 

 The Spurgewort Family. 



(EUPHORBIACE^.) 



Large woody or succulent trees, shrubs, frutlets, or herbs, 

 many annual and weedy, abounding more or less in milky 



