EDIBLE FRUITS OF THE RIO NEGRO. 185 
chewing it a slight burning sensation remains for a time in the fauces. 
I send a sufficient quantity of the bark to enable it to be analysed in 
England. 
4. Pepino do mato, Portug.—Ambelania ? (Nat. Ord. Apocynee.) 
Has. Barra; dense shady forest. Fruit ripe in March. 
Slender, branched tree, of 15-30 feet, with copious viscid sweet 
milk. Leaves opposite, exstipulate, stalked, coriaceous, smooth, ovali- 
oblong, subapiculate, obtuse, rounded at the base, beset with nume- 
rous minute glandular dots; veins rather numerous, parallel, combined 
into a longitudinal vein just within the margin. Fruit axillary, solitary, 
shortly pedunculate, superior, stipate, with small fleshy 5-lobed calyx, 
yellowish, 43 by 13 inches, oblong-obovate, obtuse, with five sub-pro- 
minent ribs, alternating with calyx-lobes, and terminating near the base 
in a small protuberance; between the ribs longitudinally rugose, and 
very sparingly muricate (so as to resemble a cucumber); two-celled; cells 
narrow, destitute of pulp, 00-seeded ; sareocarp thick, firm, very milky, 
smelling like a ripe apple when cut across, sweet-tasted. Seeds brown, 
oval, plano-convex ; testa thin, hard ; embryo in the axis, and nearly as 
long as the horny albumen ; cotyledons minute, roundish ; radicle long, 
fusiformi-terete. id 
This seems distinct from any described genus of Apocynee ; it is 
perhaps nearest 4mbelania, Aubl. The dotted leaves and intramarginal 
vein show an unexpected approach to Myrtles.—1 cannot make out 
that it has any native Indian name; the Tapuyas of whom I have 
inquired all call it “ Pepino do mato,” or the “ Forest Cucumber.” 
5. Cupua-t, Ling. Ger.—(Nat. Ord. ?) 
Has. Barra; near forest-streams. Fruit ripe in March. 
Straight tree of 30 feet by 6 inches, with rather long weak branches. 
Ramuli and short thick petioles ferruginous. Leaves alternate, exstipu- 
late, 14 inches long by 5 broad, oblong, passing rather suddenly into 
a slender apiculus, cordate and subunequal at base, penniveined, mar- 
gins undulate, under surface grey with minute pubescence, scattered 
among which are brown stellate hairs, the latter more numerous on the 
veins. Fruit terminal, pedunculate, solitary (?), superior, 5 inches by 3, 
oblong, obtuse, mostly contracted » the — oe -— minute 
i rsed with ferruginous lepra, 4-ce!ec ; pericarp 
pi eH Seale d immersed in fleshy subacid pulp, and at- 
tached to an axile placenta, ovate subcompressed, of the size of a 
2B 
VOL. V. 
