54 Mr. Colebkooke on the Indian Species of Menispermum 



One more plant is to be mentioned, which is remarkable for 

 its peculiar habit ; differing from the whole of the natural order 

 to which it belongs, as it is arboreous, while all the rest are 

 twining shrubs. I mean M. laurifolium of Roxburgh: seen like- 

 wise by Dr. Buchanan Hamilton and General Hardwicke. The 

 male plant alone has been figured and fully described ; the in- 

 florescence only of the female : but notwithstanding its singular 

 habit, which might give occasion to surmise that it has not found 

 its proper place, there is nothing in the fructification, as deli- 

 neated, which affords any support to such a surmise. It has a 

 three-leaved calyx, a much larger three-petalled corol, six nec- 

 tarial scales (inner corol), and as many stamina. Probably, 

 therefore, it will remain where it has been put, or rather will pass 

 with its congeners into the genus Cocculus. 



A singular vivaciousness has been remarked in three or four, 

 and probably holds in more, species of this genus. Wherever 

 the climbing and rambling stem is divided, whether cut or 

 broken, it roots afresh by sending down from the upper portion 

 a thread-shaped root to the ground, and thus continues to derive 

 nourishment from the soil, however distant. Such radicant 

 fibres have been measured thirty feet long, and no thicker than 

 a packthread. This character of vivaciousness appertains to 

 Cocculus tomentosus, crispus, and cordifolius ; as also C. Malabo- 

 ricus, a plant figured in the Hortus Malabaricus*, but which has 

 not been re-examined since the days of Van Rheede. 



Without any design of undertaking to treat the subject fully, 

 or of attempting to exhaust the topic, a few observations may be 

 here added, tending to clear the way in some measure towards a 

 future reform. 



The generic character of Decandolle's Cocculus, as it will be 

 here taken, is confined within more restricted limits than as given 



* Vol. vii. t. 19 and 20. 



by 



