THE HOLLY. 



69 



height of a man's knee, and from its having, like 

 the true Holly, prickly leaves. 



The most interesting species of foreign Holly 

 is the Ilex Paraguay ensis^ the foUov^ing account 

 of w^hich is condensed from the first volume of the 

 London Journal of Botany. 



Fev7 persons are ignorant of the fact, that, 

 throughout a large portion of South America, a 

 favorite beverage is employed under the name of 

 Mate or Paraguay Tea ; but many are of opinion 

 that the plant producing it resembles the Tea- 

 plant of China, little aware that it is a kind of 

 Holly, and a species not very unlike some of 

 the varieties of our English Holly. Until about 

 1823, nothing vrhatever w^as knov^n respecting 

 the particular genus and species of the shrub 

 v^hose leaves furnished the Mate or Paraguay 

 Tea. The former of these appellations originated 

 in the name of the cup Mate," from which 

 the tea was drunk. It had further the name 

 of Yerha, the herb. A French Naturalist, St. 

 Hilaire, appears to be the first European who 

 furnished a botanical account of the plant. He 

 found it growing abundantly in the woods of 

 Paraguay, both in flower and fruit, and was 

 enabled to pronounce it to be an Ilex. It forms a 

 small upright growing tree, about fifteen feet high. 

 The trunk is about the thickness of a man's thigh, 

 with a shining and whitish bark, and branches, 

 which, like those of the laurel, grow pointing 

 upwards, and the whole plant has a tufted and 

 much branched appearance. In those situations 

 where the leaves are regularly gathered, it only 

 forms a shrub, because it is periodically stripped 

 of all its foliage and small branches every year. 



