Page:Madras Journal of Literature and Science, series 1, volume 6 (1837).djvu/267

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1837.]
Remarks on the Gamboge Tree of Ceylon.
245

Stalagmitis Cambogioides. Moon's Cat. of Plants in Ceylon, Part I. p. 73.

Descr. A Tree of moderate size. Leaves opposite, petiolate, obovato-elliptical, abruptly subacuminate, coriaceous, smooth, shining, dark-green above, paler below, veins in the recent state inconspicuous, especially above; in the dried state, distinct on both sides. Flowers unisexual, monæcious, (or diæcious?). Male small (eight to nine lines across), clustered in the axils of the Petioles, on short single-flowered peduncles. Sepals four, subequal, imbricated, concave, membranous, veined, the outer subentire, and somewhat coriaceous in the bud, the inner sparingly denticulato-ciliate, yellow on the inside, yellowish- white on the outside. Petals four, spathulato-elliptical, coriaceous, crenulate, longer than the calyx, yellowish-white, red on the inside near the base, deciduous. Stamens monadelphous; column four-sided; Anthers in a roundish capitulum, terminal upon a short clavate free portion of the filament, opening by the circumcision of a flat umbilicate lid; pollen yellow, granules elliptical. No trace of a Germen. Female Flower unknown. Berry about the size of a Cherry, round, with a firm reddish-brown external coat, and sweet pulp, four-locular, surrounded at the base by the persisting calyx and a few free abortive stamens, crowned with the four-lobed tubercled sessile Stigma; loculament single-seeded. Seeds large in relation to the berry, reniform-elliptical, compressed laterally, integuments yellowish-brown, easily separable into two layers; Cotyledons thick, cohering into an uniform cellular mass; radicle central, filiform, slightly curved.

Native of Ceylon.—For the colour and several other parts of the description, I am indebted to Mrs. Walker.


2. Hebradendron ellipticum; floribus masculis axillaribus, fasciculatis; sepalis exterioribus junioribus minoribus; foliis lanceolato-ellipticis, apice sensim attenuatis.


Synonym.

Garcinia elliptica. Wall. List of Indian Plants, No. 4869 (net Choisy in De Cand. Prodr. l. 561).

I know nothing of this species, but from the specimens sent by Dr. Wallich to Sir W. J. Hooker's Herbarium and to my own. The specific character which I have drawn up, may therefore seem insufficient to distinguish it; and I might perhaps, have considered it only a variety of H. Cambogioides, but for the complete identity of form in the specimens from Dr. Wallich; their prima-facie difference from any of those received from Mrs. Walker; their considerably larger dissimilar leaves, and also their very different geographical position, less unlikely to possess natives of Siam than of Ceylon, Dr. Wallich's plants were obtained in Silhet.—Companion to the Botanical Magazine, No. 19, page 193-200.