SALSOLA, in botany, sate.wort, a genus of the Pentandria Digynia class and or der. Natural order of Holoracem. Atri plices, Jussieu. Essential character : ca lyx five-leaved ; corolla none ; capsule one-seeded ; seed screw-shaped. There are thirty-one species. These plants are well known for producing alkaline salt, commonly called barilla, soda, or kelp ; many of them are herbaceous and annual, some have shrubby stems. The leaves are generally alternate, in some opposite, others round or flat ; flowers terminat ing or axillary. S. kali grows naturally in the salt marshes in divers parts of Eng land. It is an annual plant, which rises above five or six inches high, sending out many side branches, which spread on every side, with short awl-shaped leaves, which are fleshy, and terminate in acute spines. S. soda rises with herbaceous stalks near three feet high, spreading wide. The leaves on the principal stalk, and those on the lower part of the branches, are long, slender, and have no spines : those on the upper part of the stalk and branches are slender, short, and crooked. All the sorts of glass-wort are
sometimes promiscuously used for mak ing soda or mineral alkali, but this spe cies is esteemed best. The manner of making it as follows : having dug a trench near the sea, they place laths across it, on which they lay the herbs in heaps, and having made a fire below, the liquor which runs out of the herbs drops to the bottom, which at length thicken ing, becomes soda, which is partly of a black, and partly of an ash-colour, very sharp and corrosive, and of a saltish taste. This, when thoroughly hardened, be comes like a stone, and in that state is transported to different countries for the making of glass, soap, &c.