Branch-stem angle

Usage examples of axil.

The floriferous character of the plant may be inferred from the fact that, after the raceme fades, there pushes from the axil a peduncle, which, in a short time, produces many other racemes.

To see the clusters of waxy flowers these branches must be raised, when it will be seen that the flower stalks issue from the axils of the leaves all along the branches.

The solitary flowers are produced on rather long stems from the axils of the leaves.

The leaves, which are rather larger than a shilling, fleshy, cupped, and glaucous, are curiously arranged on the stems, somewhat reflexed, and otherwise twisted at their axils, presenting a flattened but pleasing appearance.

In each of these eyes, formed in the axils of the leaves, the power of the plant is present in its entirety, very much as in each single seed.

They are fleshy shrubs, with rounded, woody stems, and numerous succulent branches, composed in most of the species of separate joints or parts, which are much compressed, often elliptic or suborbicular, dotted over in spiral lines with small, fleshy, caducous leaves, in the axils of which are placed the areoles or tufts of barbed or hooked spines of two forms.

In each of these eyes, formed in the axils of the leaves, the power of the plant is present in its entirety, very much as in each single seed.

This latter, the commonest of the species on the island, produces its flowers in long spikes in the axils of the leaves on the minor branches, weighting such branches with semi-pendulous plumes laden with haunting perfume.

In this country it cannot so easily be cultivated in the open as the common Lavender, to which it has a very close similarity, but from which it can be distinguished by the inflorescence, which is more compressed, by the bracts in the axils of which the flowers are placed being much narrower and by the leaves which are broader and spatula shaped.

The flowers are placed three or four together in the axils of the upper leaves, which often have a purplish tint and are two-lipped, of a bright purplish blue, with small white spots on the lower lip, or more rarely white or pink and open early in April.