THRIFT — continued. 
The primary root is perennial, and the short shoot made each year dies down 
almost entirely, the next year’s shoot arising as an axillary branch on the remnant. 
The leaves are all radical and very narrow ; and the inflorescence is a naked scape 
bearing a dense hemispherical head of shortly-stalked flowers in cincinni, i.e. 
unilateral cymes, surrounded by membranous bracts. The outer of these bracts are 
united and reflexed, forming a membranous sheath round the upper end of the 
peduncle. The calyx of each flower is membranous and inferior, but is prolonged 
upwards into a funnel-shaped limb, coloured at first and supported on five ribs. 
This in an enlarged withered condition serves as a sort of parachute to aid in the 
dispersal of the fruit by the wind. The deeply-separated petals also persist, and the 
tube formed by their bases is lined by hairs protecting the honey secreted at the 
bottom. The flowers, thus rendered conspicuous by being massed together, are 
sweet-scented, and are thus fully adapted to insect-pollination. 
“When the flower opens,” writes Lord Avebury, “the five stigmas are in the centre surrounded by the anthers, which 
are over the honey. Subsequently they change places, the stigmas moving outwards, the anthers approaching the centre of 
the flower. Finally the stigmas wind spirally, and touch the anthers.” 
Self-pollination would thus seem not to be prevented as a last resource. 
The commonest variety, both on most of our coasts and on Scawfell and other 
lesser mountains, has very slender, one-veined leaves, slightly flattened on their upper 
surfaces. Another form, var. planifolia Syme, with broader blunt leaves, some 
of which have three veins, is characteristic of the Scottish mountains. The form 
represented on our Plate would seem to be a third, var. duriuscula Babington, 
characteristic of our southern shores, with very slender, slightly three-sided, 
one-veined leaves, channelled along their upper sides. 
The maritime form of Thrift forms a special feature in the particular salt-marsh 
association, covered only by the higher tides, known to ecologists as the Glycerietum 
maritimae from the dominant grass Glyceria ( Sclerochloa ) maritime i, which forms a 
dense turf studded over in summer by the rose-pink and lavender blossoms of 
Statice and Limonium. It is the dense tufts of its grass-like leaves in such situations 
that have obtained for Thrift such names as Sea Grass, Sea Turf, and Our Lady s 
Pincushion (probably Pink Cushion ). The name Thrift itself is, as Dr. Prior explains, 
the passive participle of the old verb to “ threave,” meaning “ to press together,” 
in other words the Clustered Pink, probably rather with reference to the crowded 
flowers than to the tufted leaves. 
Thrift is a cottage-garden favourite as an edging for borders, and there are 
several fine garden varieties and allied species, with pink, crimson, and white flowers, 
which prefer well-drained sandy soil and are by no means difficult to cultivate. 
