NOTICES OF BOOKS AND MEMOIRS. 55 



figure* as the inflorescence of Cordia seems very risky. In no 

 case, however, was Unger justified in declaring the fruits pre- 

 sei-ved in the Berhn Museum and determined by Kunthf to be 

 those oi Mimiisops Elengi, L. [Sapotacecc), to be the fruits of Cordia. 

 These fruits have proved, on a more exact comparison, not to be 

 those of the tree mentioned, which is a native of India, but those 

 of another species, Mimusops Kummel, Hochst., a native of Tropical 

 Africa. They have, according to Schweinfurth's notes, the form 

 and colour of hips. The rather thin flesh of the fruit, which 

 according to Schimper| has a mealy sweet taste and is pleasant to 

 eat, surrounds a Very large stone which encloses a seed with a 

 hard testa and a bitter kernel. The seeds determined by Kunth§ 

 to be those of a species of Diospyros, have turned out to belong 

 to the same species of Mimusops. 



[It is certainly a noteworthy coincidence that the leaves of this 

 tree, the fruits of which are i^reserved in the Berlin Museum (and 

 presumabl}^ also in the Florentine Museum, as Minusops Elengi, L.)' 

 have been found in another Egyptian collection. In a short visit 

 to the Leyden Museum, P. A.scherson|| noticed a box full of 

 leaves, which according to the kind information of the conservator, 

 Mr. Pleyte, belonged previously to different funeral wreaths found 

 with several mummies of the same museum. These leaves, for 

 the most part folded together and strung on strips of split-up 

 palm leaves, turned out to be those of ^linuisojjs Kummel, from 

 several specimens kindly sent by Mr. Pleyte. 



This use of the leaves makes it highly probable that Mimusops 

 Kumviel was cultivated in ancient Egypt, a fact, which even from 

 the occurrence of the fruits in tombs could not be inferred, since 

 these might very well have been imported from their native 

 land, e.g., Abyssinia. In modern Egypt this tree is not to be 

 foundii, and ranks therefore in some degree with the Papyrus and 

 Xelumbium, which from discontinued use have likewise disap^Deared 

 from Egyi3t in the course of the century. About the funeral 

 wreaths of the Leyden Museum, Mr. Pleyte has made the following 

 communication to P. Ascherson : — " The mummies, which were 

 adorned originally with crowns of Mimusops leaves, belong to later 

 epochs, partly to the first Grseco-Eoman times. These crowns 

 were ornamented with different flowers. 



In the s^Decimens sent, the following species were distin- 

 guished : — 



* L. c, Fig. 30. 



+ ' Passalacqua Cat.', p. 228. ' Ann. Sc. Nat. ' viii., p. 421 . 



+ ' Schweinfurth, Beitrag zur flora Aethiopiens,' p. 85. 



§ ' Passalacqua Catal.', p. 228. ' Ann. Sc. Nat.' viii., p. 420. 



II ' Sitzungsber. d. Ges. naturf. Freunde', Berlin, 15 Mai, 1877, p. 159. 

 ^ Mimusops Elengi, L., is found as a rarity in the garden Maniel on the 

 Island of Ptodali, near Cairo, where Ibrahim-Pasha caused to be planted about 

 thirty years ago a number of trees imported direct from the East Indies. 

 Delchevallerie (Cat. rais. prod, d'hist. et. d'agric. exp. par la direction des 

 domaines du Khedive d'Egypte a Cologne 1875, p. 6), gives as the Arabian name 

 Sagariudy, t. «„ Indian tree. 



