92 
J 
r 
colour ; tlie male flowers have nine ^ filaments, crowned with round 
antherse ; the bradea^ are linear, and placed at the bafe of the 
dicles ; there is no calyx, and the berries produced by the fen 
flowers are fimilar in fliape and colour ^ to thofe of the cinnamon 
[See plate 27.] 
The SaiTafras tree is a native of North America,'' and appears to 
have been cultivated in England fometime before the year 1633, for 
in Johnfon's edition of Gerard, he fays, " I have given the figure 
of a branch taken from a little (SaiTafras) tree, which grew in the 
garden of Mr. Wilmote at Bow.":j: It is faid that the SafTafras-tree 
was firft difccvered by the Spaniards in 1538, when they pofTeffed 
themfelves of Florida : '' and the wood was firft imported into Spain 
the } 
acquired great reputation for curing 
^ 
various difeafes/ It is now ufually imported here in long flraight 
pieces, very light, of a fpungy texture, and covered v;ith a rough 
fungous bark. It, has a fragrant imell, and a fweetifh aromatic 
fubacrid tafte : the root, wood, and bark, agree in their medical quali- 
ties, and are all mentioned in the pharmacopoeias; but the bark is the 
moft fragrant, and thought to be more efficacious than the woody 
part, and the fmall branches are preferred to the large pieces. " The 
virtues of SaiTafras are extraded totally by fpirit, but not perfedly 
v/ater. Diililled with the latter it yields a fragrant eilential oil of 
Miller fays eight, but in the fpecimen figured, v/hich was procured from a male tree 
tie Kind's erarden at Kew^ nine ftamina were obferved in all the flowers. 
b Marfhall, 1. c. 
G 
fiquidem" affirmat SafTafras Florida^ lignum decorticatum vix uUius dignitatis efTe, cum 
Brafilienfe eximise dignitatis & virtutis habeatur, atque a cortice liberatum in aliquot 
annos immune fervatur/' Vide Raii Hift. p. 1569. 
t T 
Ger; 
qui SaiTafras 
Tho. Johnfonus 
Guliel. Coys 
Stratfordi^ prope Londinum ramulum defcribit & depingit, &c. Hift. L c. 
r 
d " It is called cinnamon-wood on account of its fmell, which made the Spaniards, 
when they conquered Florida, in T538, under Ferdinand de Soto, hope to find that 
valuable fpicery there, which grows only in'Ceylon/' -Savary Di£i 
^^ Ligni quoddam genus ex Florida, nunc recens in Hifpaniam Invehitur, cujus 
G 
es 
mirum in modum 
praedicans advcrius varios morbos^ ut Galli experti erant, ab incolis edocti. — ^^Dicitur 
G3;liis 
? 
^ 3 
ffafras/' Monard. Hiji. ed anno 1569. 
a penetrating 
! 

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