Spindle Tree

Spindle-Tree (Euonymus curopaeus), a British shrub, belonging to the order Celastraceae, the wood of which was formerly known as prickwood, skewerwood, pegwood, and dog-wood. It has ovate-lanceolate, glossy, deciduous leaves, small, pale-green, tetramerous flowers, and fleshy, dehiscent, rose-pink fruits of three or four united carpels, each of which, on splitting, discloses an orange aril covering the one seed it contains. Tennyson speaks of this as

"the fruit,
Which in our winter woodland looks a flower."

Evergreen exotic species, especially E. Japonicus and E. latifolius, are largely grown in our London squares, and flower freely on our southern coasts.