torch HOltTUS JAMAICENS1S S3$ 



round, striated, smooth ; leaves alternate, ovate-lanceolate, aenfninate, nerved, spreal- 

 ing, entire, smooth on both sides ; two smaller leaflets at the hase of the middle, and 

 two above it : petioles very short, compressed, channelled, half-embracing, membra- 

 naceous at the edge, with a red spot at ihe base underneath. Flowers terminating 1 , 

 sub-panicled, commonly in spikes, sessile, scattered, approximating; leaflets sessile 

 tinder the flowers ; calyx inferior, bellying in tiie m.ddle, and towards the base five- 

 grooved, with glanduliferous hairs ; border of the corolla five-parted ; parts roundish, 

 emarginate, with a very short point in the middle ; nectaries roundish, yellow, round 

 the germ, inserted into the bottom of the calyx : filaments thickened, approximating, 

 awl- shaped; anthers placed on the top of the filaments, blue; style the length of the 

 stamens; seed coated, as it were included in a capsule, and covered with the perma- 

 nent calyx. Native of Jamaica, in dry hedges. Swartz. Sloane says it grew plenti- 

 fully on both sides the road to Passage-Fort. Barham calls it tooth-wort, and says it 

 is so called from the form and colour of the root, which is very white, and is composed, 

 as it were, of a great many teeth. We have a sort of it growing in America; some 

 will have it to be a sort of leal-wort. This plant hath a viscous green calyx, in which 

 is a white pentapetalous flower, like the lychnis sylvestrisjiore a/ho, with a rough viscid 

 capsula, which catches flies. This plant is not a true climber, and yet it cannot sup- 

 port itself, it generally growing amongst shrubs. It is counted a cooling, drying, and 

 restringent plant, therefore good in ruptures, and a good vulnerary herb for wounds : 

 Some make it to have the properties of wild campions, others of Jung wort. Browne 

 fiays it is of an acid corrosive nature. 



TORCH THISTLE. CACTUS. 



Cl. 12, or. 1. Icosandria molio'gynia. Nat.' or Succalenfx. 



Gen. char. See Tndinn Fig, vol. 1, p. 408. Thereare two species of this genus called! 

 torch-thistleordildoes, the repandus and the peruvianas; the third Species described 

 under this article was not known to be in Jamaica when the accounts of the other 

 -species of Cactus referred to were published, and is therefore here introduced. 



1. REHANDUS. REPANB1. 



Ceifus crgssissimus, fructu intus et e.z/tis rubro. Sloane, v. 2, p. 

 157. Erectus cylindraceus erecfus suka/us tenttior, summit ate at- 

 tenuattts ; aculeis cetffertis. Browne, p 238, C. 9. 



Erect, long, eight-angled; angles compressed, waved ; spines longer than the wool, 

 Tiie roots of this tree, when young, are spread on the surface of the ground, for se- 

 veral feet distance, solid, of a chesnut colour The stem is upright, twenty feet high, 

 jointed at every twoor three feet, and about sixteen inch.es in circumference; channelled 

 on the sides with eight, nine, or ten, deep furrows, which are armed at their angles 

 with tufts of white prickles, ifn a star-like form : it is hollow, full of a fibrous green 

 thick pulp. The branches proceed from tiie joints, and again produce other branches, 

 or leaves The flowers grow from tiie angles towards the top, having a thick, fleshy, 

 scaly, round, channelled, hairy peduncle, supporting a swelling germ, upon the top 

 of which sits the scaly prickly calyx, closely surrounding the corolla, till a little time 

 before it expands ; the petals are long and white. The fruit is about the size of a ber- 

 gamot pear, having many soft spines on the skin, sticking close to tiie stem, the out- 



G g 2 side, 



