PER. FLOWERS minute, bright lilack, or light purple, extremely beautiful. Panicles axillary one to each leaf, two-forked, very fhort in comparifon of the leaves, downy. Bracts awled, oppofite, placed at each fork of the panicle. Leaves oppofite, petioled, very long, egged, veined, pointed, obtufely-notched, bright green and soft above, pale and downy beneath. Branches and petiols hoary with down. Shrub, with flexible branches; growing wild near Calcutta: its root has medicinal virtues, and cures, they fay, a cutaneous disorder called máfha, whence the plant has its name. Though the leaves be not fawed, yet I dare not pronounce the fpecies to be new. See a note on the Hoary CALLICARPUS, 5 RETZ. Fafcic. p. 1. n. 19. 16. SRINGA'TA: SYN. S'ringátaca. VULG. Singhára. LINN. Floating TRAPA. I can add nothing to what has been written on this remarkable waterplant; but as the ancient Hindus were fo fond of its nut (from the horns of which, they gave a name to the plant itself), that they placed it among their lunar conftellations, it may certainly claim a place in a series of Indian vegetables. 17. CHANDANA: SYN. Gandhafára, Malayaja, Bhadras'rì. VULG. Chandan, Sandal, Sanders. LINN. True Santalum ; more properly Sandalum. SEED large, globular, smooth. Having received from Colonel FULLARTON many feeds of this exquifite plant, which he had found in the thickets of Midnapúr, I had a fanguine hope of being able to defcribe its flowers, of which RUMPHIUS could procure no account, and concerning which there is a fingular difference between LINNAEUS and BURMAN the younger, though they both cite the fame authors, and each refers to the works of the other; but the feeds have never germinated in my garden, and the Chandan only claims a place in the present series, from the deserved celebrity of its fragrant wood, and the perpetual mention of it in the most ancient books of the Hindus, who conftantly defcribe the best fort of it as flourishing on the mountains of Malaya. An elegant Sanfcrit stanza, of which the following Verfion is literally exact, alludes to the popular belief, that the Vénus, or bambus, as they are vulgarly called, often take fire by the violence of their collifion, and is addreffed, under the allegory of a fandal-tree to a virtuous man dwelling in a town inhabited by contending factions: " Delight of the world, be"loved CHANDANA, stay no longer in this forest, which is overspread "with rigid pernicious Vans'as, whose hearts are unfound; and who, being themselves confounded in the fcorching stream of flames "kindled by their mutual attrition, will confume not their own fami"lies merely, but this whole wood." The original word durvans'a has a double sense, meaning both a dangerous bambu, and a man with a mischievous offspring.. Three other species or varieties of Chandan are mentioned in the Amaracófha, by the names Tailaparnica, Gós'írsha, and Herichandana: the red fandal (of which I can give no defcription) is named Cuchandana from its inferiour quality, Ranjana and Racta from its colour, and Tilaparni or Patránga from the form of its leaves. 18. CUMUDA: SYN. Cairava. RHEEDE: RHEEDE: Tsjeroea Cit Ambel. 11 H. M. t. 29. CAL. Five-parted, longer than the tube of the corol, expanding, permanent; divifions, awled. COR. One-petaled. Tube, rather belled; border five-parted; divifions oblong, wavy on the margin; a longitudinal wing or foldlet in the middle of each. The mouth and whole interior part of the corol fhaggy. STAM. Filaments five, awled, ere&t; Anthers twin, converging; five, alternate, fhorter, fterile. PIST. Germ egged, very large in proportion; girt at its base with five roundish glands. Style very short, if any. Stigma headed. PER. Capfule four-celled, many-feeded. SEEDS round, compreffed, minute, appearing rough, with small dots or points. LEAVES hearted, fubtargeted, bright green on one fide, dark ruffet on the other. Flowers umbel fafcicled, placed on the stem, just below the leaf. Glands and Tube of the corol yellow; border white; both of the most exquifite texture: Cumuda, or Delight of the Water, seems a general name for beautiful aquatick flowers; and among them, according to VAN RHEEDE, for the Indian Menianthes; which this in part resembles. The divifions of the corol may be called threewinged: they look as if covered with filver frost. 19. CHITRACA: SYN. Pát'b'in, Vahni, and all other names of Fire. CAL. Perianth one-leaved, egg-oblong, tubular, five-fided; rugged, interspersed with minute pedicelled glands, exuding transparent glutinous droplets; erect, closely embracing the tube of the corol; mouth mouth five-toothed; bafe protuberant with the valves of the nectary.. COR. One-petaled, funnel-torm. Tube five-angled, rather incurved, longer than the calyx. Border five-parted, expanding. Divifions inverse, egg-oblong, pointed, fomewhat keeled. Nectary five-valved, pointed, minute, including the germ. STAM. Filaments five, thread-form, inferted on the valvelets of the nectary, as long as the tube of the corol. Anthers oblong, oblique. PIST. Germ egged, very small; at first, when cleared of the nectary, smooth; but affuming, as it fwells, five angles. Style columnar, as long as the stamens. Stigma five-parted, flender. PER. None, unless we give that name to the five-angled coat of the feed. SEED one, oblong, obfcurely five-fided, inclosed in a coat. Racemes vifcid, leafy. Calyx light green. Corol milkwhite. Anthers purple, feen through the pellucid tube. Leaves alternate, egged, smooth, pointed, half sheathing, partly waved, partly entire ; floral leaves, fimilar, minute. Stem flexible (climbing), many-angled, joined at the rise of the leaves. Root cauftick; whence the name Vahni, and the like. Chitraca means attracting the mind; and any of the Indian names would be preferable to Plumbago, or Leadwort. The fpecies here described, seems most to resemble that of Seilan; the rofy Plumbago is less common here: the joints of its stems are red; the bracts three'd, egged, equal pointed, coloured. 20. CA'MALATA': SYN. Súrya-cánti, or Sunshine, 11. H. M. t. 60. VULG. Cám-latá, Ifhk-píchah. LINN. IPOMOEA Quamoclit. The plant before us is the most beautiful of its order, both in the colour and form of its leaves and flowers; its elegant bloffoms are celef VOL. II. K tial tial rofy red, love's proper hue, and have justly procured it the name of Cámalatá, or Love's Creeper, from which I should have thought Quamoclit a corruption, if there were not fome reafon to fuppofe it an American word: Cámalatá may also mean a mythological plant, by which all defires are granted to fuch as inhabit the heaven of INDRA; and, if ever flower was worthy of paradife, it is our charming Ipomoea. Many fpecies of this genus, and of its near ally the Convolvulus, grow wild in our Indian provinces, fome spreading a purple light over the hedges, fome fnowwhite with a delicate fragrance; and one breathing after funset the odour of cloves; but the two genera are fo blended by playful nature, that very frequently they are undiftinguishable by the corols and ftigmas: for inftance, the Mundavalli, or Beautiful Climber, of RHEEDE (of which I have often watched the large fpiral buds, and seen them burst into full bloom) is called Ipomoea by LINNÆUS, and Convolvulus (according to the Supplement) by KONING; and it seems a shade between both. The divisions of the perianth are egg-oblong, pointed; free above, intricated below; its corol and tube, those of an Ipomoea; its filaments of different lengths, with anthers arrowed, jointed above the barbs, furrowed, half-incumbent; the ftigmas, two globular heads, each globe an aggregate of minute roundish tubercles; the ftem not quite fmooth, but here and there bearing a few small prickles; the very large corol exquifitely white, with greenish ribs, that seem to act as muscles in expanding the contorted bud; its odour in the evening very agreeable; lefs ftrong than the primrose and lefs faint than the lily. The clove-fcented creeper, which blows in my garden at a feafon and hour, when I cannot examine it accurately, seems of the fame genus, if not of the fame fpecies, with the Mundavalli. 21. CADAMBA: SYN. Nipa, Priyaca, Halipriya. |