SECRETED FLUIDS- 69 



Gum or mucilage, a viscid substance of little flavour 

 or smell, soluble in water, is very general. When su- 

 perabundant it exudes from many trees in the form of 

 large drops or lumps, as in Plum, Cherry, and Peach- 

 trees, and different species of Mimosa or Sensitive plants, 

 one of which yields the Gum Arabic, others the Gum 

 Senegal, &c.(6) 



Resin is a substance soluble in spirits, and much 

 more various in different plants than the preceding, as 

 the Turpentine of the Fir and Juniper, the Red Gum of 

 New South Wales, produced by one or more species 

 o^ Eucalyptus^ Bot. of N. Hall. t. 13, and the fragrant 

 Yellow Gum of the same country, see White'^s Voyage^ 

 235, which exudes spontaneously from the Xanthorrhcea 

 Hastile, Most vegetable exudations partake of a nature 

 between these two, being partly soluble in water, partly 

 in spirits, and are therefore called Gum-resins. The 

 milky juice of the Fig, Spurge, &c., which Dr. Darwin 

 has shown, and which every body may see, to be quite 

 distinct from the sap, is, like animal milk, an emulsion^ 

 or combination of a watery fluid with oil or resin. Ac- 

 cordingly, when suffered to evaporate in the air, such 

 fluids become resins or gum-resins, as the Gum Eu- 

 phorbium. In the Celandine, Chelidonium majus, Engl. 



(6) [Mucilage is found in gi'eat quantities in the root of Al- 

 thea officinalis^ or Marsh Mallow, in the inner bark of Slippery 

 Elm (Ulimisfulva), in the pith of Sassafras, in the leaves of 

 different Mallows, Violets, &c. on the seeds of Quinces and 

 i'lax.} 



