Tas, 6002. 
SARCOSTEMMA Brunonianum. 
Native of the Peninsula of India. 
Nat. Ord. AscLeptapE®.—Tribe, ASCLEPIADEH VERA. 
Genus Sarcostemma, R. Br. ; (Dene. in DC. Prodr., vol. viii. p. 537.) 
SarcostemMa Brunonianum ; volubile v. dependens, caulibus gracilibus 
cylindraceis glabris, fasciculis florum lateralibus, pedicellis calycibusque 
cano-pubescentibus, calycis lobis triangulari-ovatis acutis, corollz 
laciniis ovato-oblongis obtusis glabris, corona staminea exteriore sub- 
plicata 10-crenata, interiore antheris breviore, stigmate apiculato 
subintegro. 
Sarcostemma:Brunonianum, Wight et Arn. Contrib, p. 59; Wight Ie. t. 
1282; Dene. in DC. Prodr., vol. viii. p. 537. 
This very singular plant is a native of Ceylon, and is also 
common in arid jungles of the Madras Presidency, where it 
forms great masses, climbing over shrubs, tree-trunks and 
stones, 2abounding in an acid milky juice, and hence eaten by the : 
natives as a salad, and sucked by travellers to allay thirst, 
thus forming a remarkable exception to the usually poisonous — 
nature of the Asclepiadeous juices. Unfortunately it fre- 
quents the jungles in which the poisonous and acrid Luphor- 
bia Turiculli grows, and indeed it often spreads over that plant, 
whose leafless branches so closely resemble those of the 
Sarcostemma, that if care is not used one may be mistaken 
for the other, the consequences of which might be serious. 
Of a very closely allied species a curious use is made; bundles 
of its branches are cast into the wells from which sugar-cane 
fields are watered, together with a bag of salt, the result of 
which is that the white ant is expelled from the field. _ 
Sarcostemma Brunonianum grows freely in a pot in a 
warm greenhouse, where its branches hang down in masses 
NOVEMBER Ist, 1872. 
