Wight's botanical letters. 165 



are powdery underneath. Of LeguminoscB, I have made a 

 very large collection, but there is nothing that 1 now recol- 

 lect very particular among them. My plants of the orders 

 included in De Candolle's third and fourth volumes, are not 

 copious, nor as yet well determined. Of Composite I have 

 a good many, but I can give you no information regarding 

 them through want of my herbarium specimens. I have a 

 few good Boragineae, some new ones, and abundance of a little 

 Cuscuta, the first I have seen in India. To the Asclepiadece I 

 have made some interesting additions, one of the most grati- 

 fying being Calotropis procera. Ham. (C Hamiltoni, W. & A.) 

 which I find abundant all about this station. There is also 

 a species of Ti/lophora, of which there are specimens in Ham- 

 ilton's herbarium, but not I believe in mine. It is a little 

 herbaceous looking species, with a tuberous root, very pale 

 leaves, and no branches. I forget at present the name given 

 by him as well as that by me, but I think he calls it a Tylo- 

 phora; plant about a foot long, procumbent, afterwards 

 twining a little, leaves somewhat reniforju at the base, ovate 

 obtuse, glaucous when recent, much smaller towards the 

 flower-bearing extremity ; it grows among long grass on the 

 Copper mountains near Bellary. I have a large supply of 

 a Periploceous plant, perhaps a new genus, but so very like 

 our Toxocarpus, that I had almost passed it as such. I am 

 preparing some observations on the mode of impregnation of 

 this and some other plants of the order — To the genus 

 Euphorbia I have made some interesting additions, finely 

 characterized by the form of the petals, or petaloid scales, if 



you like that term better Among the Grominece, I have 



been particularly fortunate, having got many of which I had 

 scarcely a specimen before, and I think there are some new 

 ones ; one of these is a very common and troublesome weed 

 in the black cotton soil of this country. I have called it 

 IschcBmum villosum; an account of it is in the course of pre- 

 paration for publication in the Madras PhilosophicalJournal, 

 with reference to its injurious effects on agriculture. It has 

 immensely long creeping roots, which render it next to impos- 



