MALVACEE °°. ge 
present century as a remedy for dysentery. The ash of the 
pericarp is used in Africa for the manufacture of soap. 
Description.—The fruit varies‘much both in shape and 
size. ; some specimens correspond with the description given by 
Adanson, and others with that of Guibourt, that. is to say, they . 
are either cucumber-shaped or bottle-shaped, and from 6 to 18 ~ 
inches in length. The shell is hard, woody.and light, clothed 
with a dull-green felt-like down, composed of simple hairs ; it 
is made up of regularly arranged wood cells. intersected here 
and there by vascular bundles, The fruit is full of sub-acid 
pulp, which is divided by fibrous bands into a number of com- ” 
partments. The pulp dries up into a starch-like powder of a 
reddish-white colour, which adheres, together in polyhedral = 
masses, a seed forming the centre of each mass ; it consists. 
chiefly of mncilage-cells and contains no starch. The seeds are 
enclosed in a horny shell, having a rusty-red, rough exterior 3 
__ they are kidney-shaped and half an inch in length. The bark 
has a scabrous epidermis, and on section shows a mottled 
-yellowish-green and reddish-brown surface ; internally it is 
intimately united with the woody fibre of the trunk. The fresh — 
_” bark when wounded yields a white semi-fluid gum, which is. 
odourless and tasteless, and has an acid reaction ; it is insoluble 
in water. The ash contains a large quantity of lime. Mr. J. G. 
Prebble has brought to our notice that this gum when examined — 
under the microscope is seen to be full of well-formed clus- _ 
. tered crystals of calcium oxalate; there are also’some highly 
refractive globules of oil*or oleo-resin. With age the gun ~ 
.eventually becomes reddish-brown, — : 
fj 
- 
Microscopie structure.—A transverse section of the leafshows _ 
that the upper surface consists of a single row of large cells, : 
which: swell when boiled; but develop no mucilage. — Beneath 2 
this is a parenchyme of cells containing chlorophyll, except ov 7 
~ the central nerve, where chlorophyll is absent and the cells. 
*broken down to form a large lacuna.or depot of ma 
similar cells and smaller lacun@ are seen be 
to the number. of four or five. “ Over et 
