Robert Wight

“ The seed of several species of Sterculia are roasted and eat by the natives of this country ; but by far the most important plant of the order, at least in a dietetic point of view, is the Cacoa tree. This is a native of America, and has been introduced into India. Hitherto our attempts at culture have not been very successful, but I saw several very thriving young trees at Courtallum, and there is one at Palatncottah which annually bears a crop of fruit, and gives promise that it might be increased. ”

“ Our present knowledge of Indian medical plants is principally derived from the works of Drs. Fleming and Ainslie. These, for the most part, are little more than mere catalogues of native names of plants, with the botanical ones, so far as the authors had the means of ascertaining them, attached, but generally without descriptions, and in no instance with figures of the plants referred to, by which a person unacquainted with botany could ascertain the identity of specimens supplied by a native druggist, with the plant named in the catalogue ”

“ Uvaria, for example, to which was attributed a many-celled fruit, and two rows of seed, was found to have a one-celled ovary, and the rows of ovules, if two, so close as scarcely to be distinguishable, and in truth forming a single line attached to the inner angle ; hence the many cells, and two rows of seed observed in the mature carpel, must be produced by mere condensation of the surrounding pulp, and the divergence of the free extremities, of the seed, since they are all attached along the same angle of the seed vessel. ”

“ The cultivators of Bourbon and American cottons will do well to bear in mind the examples of the West Indies and the Mauritius, and not only attend to the occasional renewal of their stock of seed from the original source, but also to refresh the lands under cultivation every few years, by taking not one, but a succession of crops of different kinds off those tracts which have been long under cotton cultivation with only short intervals of rest. ”

“ The apparent insignificance of the other is calculated to produce the very opposite effect, while it is equally suited to display the Creator's unerring wisdom and power, by teaching him, that the same power, that filled the universe with thousands of worlds, and made and endowed him with a reflecting mind, equally made the humble fumatory, and so nicely adjusted the arrangement of its minute organs, as to prevent the loss of even a grain of pollen, thus certainly ensuring its due fecundation, and with that, the equally certain preservation of the species. ”

“ I know not that the wood itself is applied to any particular purpose, but the Negroes on the eastern coast of Africa employ the trunks in a certain state to a very extraordinary pur- pose. The tree is subject to a particular disease, owing to the attack of a species of Fungus, which vegetates in the woody part, and which, without changing its colour or appearance, destroys life, and renders the part so attacked, as soft as the pith of trees in general. ”

“ The species of Xanthophyllum are trees that furnish timber of considerable size, and being besides handsome flowering plants, deserve a place in the garden, as does Polygala arillata a very handsome flowering shrub, not uncommon on the higher hills of this country. The properties of both Xanthophyllum and P. arillata if they possess any, are unknown. It seems to me desirable to remove the latter from the genus Poly gala, from most of the species of which it differs very widely in habit and in the arillus which covers the whole of the seed. ”

“ Hilaire, the ovule of Cissampelos is attached to the middle of the side of a straight ovary, which after fecundation gradually incurves its apex until the style touches the base of the pericarp, when the two surfaces being thus brought into contact unite, and a drupe is formed, the seed of which is curved like a horse-shoe, and the cavity of which is divided by a spurious incomplete dissepiment, consisting of two plates : the attachment of the seed is at the top of the false dissepiment, on each side of which it extends equally. ”

“ Huxham a talented and enterprising merchant on the Malabar Coast, attempted the preparation of Annotto for exportation, but found the low price at which it can be produced in America, set competition from this country at defiance, though the shrub grows freely, produces fruit abundantly, and pulp of good quality. It is employed in this country as in Europe, to tinge butter, and a good deal as a dye, for the production of a pale rose colour. ”

“ The poisonous plant so employed in that part of the country is still unknown, but I dare say might on inquiry be ascertained.
While thus abounding with acrid and poisonous plants, the order includes a few of a different complexion. Several of its species are regarded as simply astringent: the seeds of Nigella, are pungent like pepper, and are employed in some parts of Europe as such, under the name of Allspice; (not the true English Allspice, which is derived from a very different source) and all the species of Coptis, are simply bitter and tonic. ”

“ This is partly true, but at the same time it is desirable to ascertain what are species and what varieties, since the term species implies permanency, while variety conveys exactly the opposite idea, or that of liability to change under any variation of the circumstances under which they may be produced, hence their aptitude for culture unchanged in some favoured situations and their disposition to change in others to all appearance equally favourable. ”

“ By the contemplation of such beautiful, though almost imperceptibly minute, arrangements of the Divine Artist, we are more surely led to form a just estimate of His infinite power, wisdom, and foresight, than even by the contemplation of the boundless vault of heaven, illuminated with the light reflected from its thousands of stars ”

“ Good seeds sometimes arrive from India; placed in a moderate hot-bed frame they will succeed well." Such are the brief and easily followed directions for the culture of these plants, which, I hope ere long, to see acted upon by the Horticultural Society for the diffusion of these beautiful trees among us. The species of Wormia, one of which is a native of Ceylon, are not less deserving of our attention, on account of the magnificence of their foliage and beauty of their flowers. Several species of Dillenia are large trees, and afford valuable timber on account of its hardness and durability. ”

“ I had not the good fortune to find fructification of some that I consider new, and can- not in consequence describe them, but their trailing arborious habit, leave little reason to doubt their being different from all those already described. ”

“ Remarks on Genera and Species. As only one genus of Berberideae has yet been met with in India, it affords no room for remark, I may however observe, that, I think there is a new species of Berberis on the Pulney mountains, referable to the section Mahonea, with pinnated leaves. I speak doubtfully, because J did not find flowers or fruit, and judge from habit alone: the Pulney plant being a diffuse shrub, with long, somewhat scandent branches, and the Neilgherry one an erect, sparingly branched tree. ”

“ If then, so much care is bestowed on the formation and preservation of the most minute objects of the creation, how much more, have we not a right to infer, is appropriated to the preservation of the Being, formed in his own likeness, gifted with reason, and endowed with an immortal soul? ”

“ This order which is very generally distributed over the globe, being found in every quarter of it, and in almost every kind of soil and climate, abounds in species, but is very limited in the number of genera, the latter, standing in the proportion of only about 1 to 19 or 20 of the former, on whole order. Among its species every form of vegetation is found, from the very minute annual scarcely 3 inches high, up to large sized trees. Many of these are milky plants, with round stems, and ex-stipulate, scattered, simple, entire, sessile, leaves, or having the limb attenuated into a short petiol. ”

“ The juice of this plant is employed in this country as a remedy for cutanious diseases, and is said to be a very effectual one. I confess I have never either prescribed the remedy myself, nor seen it employed by others. The native doctors also employ it as a remedy for ophthalmia; applied, according to my information, over the tarsus and eyelids, but according to Dr. Ainslie's statement, dropped into the eye. The oil, extracted from the seed, is, like the juice, considered a useful application in cutanious diseases, but probably merely acts as an emolient application like any other sweet oil. ”

“ In Africa we learn from the Flora Senegambiae that the fruit is equally sought after by the inhabitants, and by the wild animals of the jungles. The Authors remark, it is surprising to see, at the season of their maturity, the numbers of women and children returning towards evening, to the village, laden with these fruits, which they lay in the sun until they dry and open naturally.' The seed are prepared for use by simply boiling, and then quickly torrifying them, by which they acquire a very agreeable taste. ”

“ The long stapled or sea island cotton has not succeeded with me, not because the plants themselves have been more delicate or less adapted to our climate than the others, but because they are subject to the attacks of an insect, which deposits its eggs in the young fruit, causing blight and destruction of the produce long before it attains maturity. ”

“ When our distinctive marks are taken from the relative position and number of all the different parts of the flower to each other, the formation of the ovary, and position of the ovules, added to the general habit of the plants, we have so many points of comparison, that the chances of our being misled through variations or imperfections^ in any one set of organs, are greatly diminished. ”

“ For example, we already know that most of the species, of Habzelia, natives of both Africa, and America, are highly aromatic, and that the seed of one, or more of them, forms a considerable article of commerce, under the name of Ethiopian pepper. In Xylopia, (Bitter wood, so called from the taste of the wood) a West Indian genus, the bitter principle so universally prevails, that every part of the plants possess it. In X. glabra " the wood, bark, and berries, have an agreeable bitter taste, not unlike that of the orange seed. ”

“ To what extent these hints for the discrimination of species will be found to avail in practice, it is difficult to say, but it seems desirable that they should speedily be brought to the test of experience, since there is no genus, of the same extent, in which it is so difficult to determine the species. ”

“ In India the Capparideae are numerous, not only with reference to the number of species, but still more so with regard to individuals. Some of the herbaceous ones are our most common weeds, met with in every field, others occur in every piece of waste ground or neglected spot. ”

“ The allied genera of Cissampelos and Clypea possess bitter and tonic properties analagous to the these found in Cocculus, and are used as such by native practitioners. The roots however of Cissampelos glabra Roxb. are stated by Roxburgh to be extremely acrid, but are not-withstanding used in medicine by the native practitioners. In the West Indies and America, where the true Ciss. Pareira is found, it is much employed as a tonic in diseases of debility, as well as in those affecting the urinary organs, and is there esteemed, and even called, a universal medicine. ”

“ Salomonia has as yet only been met with in Asia, but extends from China to the Malabar Coast, being more or less met with in all the intermediate countries. Soulamia, is as yet only known to exist in the Moluccas. Xanthophyllum has a range nearly as wide as Salomonia, extending from Java, (whence Blume has three species which he had published under the generic name of Jackia) through Silhet, Ceylon, and Coromandel, to Malabar, but has not yet been met with out of Asia. Most of the other genera are American, but Muraltia is confined to the Cape of Good Hope. ”

“ Gossypium affords a striking example of this fact in a cultil vated genus : those of Sida and Abutilon are scarcely less remarkable among the uncultivated ones. Some species of each are common to the tropical regions of both the old and new world, and have in nearly all such cases received distinct names according as they happen to come from the one or other. ”

“ Roxburgh, in his Flora Indica, gives characters of 27 species, classed under three genera, namely, Anona, Uvaria, and Unona ; Guatteria, was afterwards added to the catalogue, of Indian genera, by referring several of Roxburgh's Uvaria's to that genus. These genera were distinguished by characters almost entirely taken from the fruit, without reference to the ovary, or indeed to any other part : Anona, being distinguished by having a number of carpels, united into a single compound fruit: Uvaria, by having its carpels distinct, stipitate, fleshy, many-celled, and many seeded ”

“ The Indian species of these genera are with the exception of Grewia, generally of easy discrimination, but some of those of Grewia, if really distinct (which I somewhat doubt) are most difficult to distinguish with other than most perfect specimens, the fruit affording the best, if not indeed the only marks by which they can, with certainty, be determined. ”

“ A small order of aquatic, herbaceous, floating plants; with peltate, or cordate, fleshy leaves; widely distributed over the northern, but very rare in the southern hemisphere; more remarkable for the beauty of their flowers, and peculiarities of structure of their seed, which has given rise to much discussion among Botanists as to their affinities and station in the system of vegetables, than for their useful properties. ”

“ Lindley's work, exhibiting a beautiful instance of design, observable in all the works of nature when properly studied, is too interesting to be passed over.
"The economy of the sexual organs of Fumariacece is remarkable. The stamens are in two parcels, the anthers of which are a little higher than the stigma; the two middle ones of these anthers are turned outwards, and do not appear to be capable of communicating their pollen to the stigma; the four lateral ones are also naturally turned outwards; but by a twist of their filament their face is presented to the stigma. ”

“ India according to Wallich's list has 50 species, and several have since been added. Blume describes 21 from Java — and the authors of the Flora Senegambiae 15 from that portion of Africa. It is remarkable that though both genera and species are frequent in America, Hum- boldt seems only to have found 16, at least that is all that is characterized in his synopsis. The Indian Peninsula according to our list has 32 species, one of which Berria Ammonilla is admitted as doubtful, I have never met, with it on the continent, though it abounds in Ceylon. ”

“ The belief of the natives as above stated is adverse to the supposition that the American cotton is equal in that respect to the Indian, but their conviction is formed from comparing imported European cloth, with native fabrics, which I do not consider fair subjects of comparison, in as much as India was, in the first instance and for a long time after, supplied with old cloths, the re- fuse of European warehouses, which had been deteriorated by long keeping and more or less by the processes employed in bleaching in Europe to which Indian cloths are not subjected. ”