Grass-tree

Grass-tree (Xanthorrhæa), a genus of plants of the natural order Liliaceæ, natives of Australia, and constituting a very peculiar feature in the vegetation of that part of the world. They have shrubby stems, with tufts of long wiry foliage at the summit, a long cylindrical spike of densely aggregated flowers shooting up from the centre of the tuft of leaves. The base of the inner leaves of some species is eatable, and forms, particularly when roasted, an agreeable article of food. It has a balsamic taste; and all the species abound in a resinous juice, which, on exposure to the air, hardens into a reddish-yellow inodorous substance with a shining fracture, soluble in alcohol, and useful as a tonic in dysentery, diarrhoea, and other intestinal maladies; used also by the natives of Australia for uniting the edges of wounds, and with an aluminous earth for caulking their canoes, and as a cement for various purposes.—The Common Grass-tree (X. hastilis) has a stem about four feet high, but sometimes a foot in diameter. It is of very slow growth, and is supposed to be many centuries old when it has reached such dimensions.—Several species are found in eastern Australia and also in New Zealand, where their leaves are used as fodder for all kinds of cattle.