PHYSIOLOGY OF THE RED MANGROVE. 601 



figure of the plant is very good and shows the parts dissected. The 

 lenticels on the hypocotyl are also well illustrated. 



Labat, 1724,^^ a French missionary, mentions three kinds of 

 paletuviers and says the English and Spanish call them mangles. 

 He says the three kinds are the red, the white and the black ; the red 

 and the white being called Raisinier, on account of its raisin-like 

 edible fruit, and the Mahot, respectively. The black paletuvier is 

 evidently the Rhicophora mangle. He mentions its laurel-like leaf 

 and states that it grows " 5 cens " out in the sea supported on prop 

 roots. " The wood makes good fuel and oysters are borne on the 

 roots which are small but of a good taste." 



Sir Hans Sloane, 1725,^'' who was a close observer and a good 

 botanist, describes the mangrove at great length as he saw it in the 

 West Indies. He also mentions almost all the previous voyagers and 

 travelers who have seen this curious tree, as w-ell as his contempo- 

 raries. Catesby, Plumier, Dampier and Plukenet. His description is 

 very clear and to the point in that it evidently applies to the " [Man- 

 gle grande " type. " This Tree rises to thirty or forty Foot high 

 having a Trunc as big as one's Body, and a greenish white, smoothe 

 Bark, with some w^hite Spots here and there. The Tree has very 

 many pendulous Branches swelling towards their Ends, where are 

 placed nine or ten Leaves, set on round them by half Inch long 

 Footstalk, they are four Inches long and two broad, of a dirty green 

 Colour and having one very large eminent Rib running the length 

 of the Leaf ; the Flowers stand on an inch long Footstalk, are com- 

 posed of four thick yellow Petala and as many brown, with some 

 yellow Stamina in the Middle being within covered with a yellow 

 Farina, to which Pod-like Substances, having a Swelling at their 

 Beginning, otherwise exactly like Bobbins with which Bone-Laces 

 are wrought, that Protuberance is rough and a little redish in 

 Colour, about an Inch long, having within a Cavity fitted to receive 

 the small Ends of the Pod-like Substances, and into which they are 

 set, each of them is about six Inches long, beginning slender, swell- 

 ing by Degrees to near the end where it is Biggest. ... It has a 



-5 Labat, Pere, " Xouveau Yoj-age aux Isles de I'Amerique," Vol. II., p. 

 136, 1724. 



-'^ Sloane, Sir Hans, " A Voyage to the Islands Madeira, Barbados, Ja- 

 maica, etc.," 1725. 



