formerly to be imported into Europe: but it is extremely dif- 
ferent from the true Ebony of commerce, Diospyros Ebenus of 
Madagascar; and the trunk, rarely exceeding four inches in 
diameter, can only yield small samples for cabinet-work. ‘“ The 
slender branches,” says Patrick Browne, “are very tough and 
flexile, frequently used for riding-switches, and in his days 
(days happily now gone by) generally kept at all the wharfs 
about Kingston to scourge the refractory slaves.” 
Descr. A shrub or small tree, from eight or ten to forty feet high, 
with long twiggy branches, armed with short, sharp, subulate, sti- 
pulary spines. Leaves solitary or in clusters, box-like, evergreen, 
obovato-cuneate, sessile. Flowers axillary, solitary, or two or 
three together. Peduncle short, with a pair of minute, opposite, 
small bracts above or near the middle. Calya bell-shaped, 
pubescent, obscurely two-lipped: upper lip bipartite, Jower tri- 
partite; segments ovate, acute, the lowest one spreading, the rest 
erect. Corolla bright orange-yellow. Veaillum subrotund, with 
deep purple streaks in the centre. A/e and carina oblong, some- 
what falcate, obtuse ; all the petals with short claws. Stamens ten, 
monadelphous, nearly as long as the ale. Anthers subglobose. 
Pistil hairy. Ovary oblong, of two joints, the upper side with 
an even line, below bigibbose, the upper jomt tapering into a 
long subulate style: stigma a mere point. “ Legumen pedicelled, 
not an inch in length, compresso-foliaceous, with the valves char- 
taceous, hirsute with minutely capitate hairs, biarticulate ; lower 
joint with the upper suture nearly straight, and the under con- 
vex ; upper joint small, abortive.” J7 ‘Fadyen. 
_ Fig. 1. Calyx, stamens, and pistil. 2. Vexillum. 8. One of theale. 4. Ca- 
rina. 5. Pistil:—all magnified. 
