308 Dr. Francis Hamilton's Commentary 



conscious, perhaps, that they could not belong to the same spe- 

 cies, and not knowing which to select ; but he quotes both the 

 Fonnam Tagera and the Senna vigintifolia of Burman for his Cassia 

 Sophera {Sp. PL ii. 525.), leaving us without any hint to enable 

 us to judge which he meant. He had not indeed seen the plant. 



M. Lamarck, having seen specimens, fails not to observe 

 that the legumen is not cylindrical, as asserted by Burman. It 

 is therefore clear that he meant the Ponnam Tagera, although he 

 quotes also Burman {Enc. Meth. i. 649-). 



Dr. Roxburgh thought that there were three species of Cassia 

 very nearly allied, the C. Sophera, C. esculenta and C purpurea 

 {Hort. Peng. 31.), and furnished me with the characters by which 

 he thought they could be distinguished ; but after much labour 

 bestowed on examining many specimens in different situations 

 and places, I could not observe any of these characters, that 

 could be considered so appropriate to these different varieties, 

 as to satisfy me that they were really distinct species. The 

 furthest that I have been enabled to advance towards satisfaction 

 on this point is, that perhaps the Gallinaria acutifolia of Rum- 

 phius may be considered as the C. esculenta, and may be distin- 

 guished petalo supremo integro from the Ponnam Tagera or C So- 

 phera petalo supremo retuso ; but I am unwilling to rest on such 

 minutiae. 



It must be observed that, before the legumen is fully ripe, it 

 is much flatter than when it has come to maturity, when it is very 

 turgid, although always compressed. Specimens from Ava, 

 which I collected in this state, and with four or five pair of leaf- 

 lets, as usual, were sent home under the name of Cassia planisi- 

 Uqua ; while those with fully matured legumina and more nume- 

 rous leaflets, collected on the same journey, and compared by 

 Dr. Roxburgh with his drawings, were called C. purpurea. Both 

 are now probably under these names in the Banksian herbarium ; 



and 



