Lycium


LYCIUM BARBARUM.--Box Thorn, or Tea Tree. North Asia, 1696. A pretty

lax, trailing shrub, with long, slender, flexible twigs, small

linear-lanceolate leaves, and rather sparsely-produced lilac or violet

flowers. Planted against a wall, or beside a stout-growing, open-habited

shrub, where the peculiarly lithe branches can find support, this plant

does best. Probably nowhere is the Box Thorn so much at home as in

seaside
places, it then attaining to sometimes 12 feet in height, and

bearing freely its showy flowers during summer, and the bright scarlet

or orange berries in winter.



L. EUROPAEUM.--European Box Thorn. South Europe, 1730. This is a spiny,

rambling shrub, that may often be seen clambering over some cottage

porch, or used as a fence or wall plant in many parts of England. It

often grows nearly 20 feet long, and is then a plant of great beauty,

with linear-spathulate leaves of the freshest green, and pretty little

pink or reddish flowers. For quickly covering steep, dry banks and

mounds where few other plants could exist this European Box Thorn is

invaluable. Either species will grow in very poor, dry soil, and is

readily propagated by means of cuttings.



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