STAR ANISE. 171 



In the Pharmaceutical Journal of 11th Aug., 18S8, the above 

 mentioned facts are referred to by Mr. Holmes, who there 

 remarks : — " These notes appear to have attracted the attention of 

 the late Dr. Hance, who in October, 1881, forwarded seeds of the 

 true plant received from Pakhoi to Kew. In the same year fruit 

 and fragments of the leaves were forwarded by Mr. C. Ford from 

 Hong Kong Botanical gardens, to Kew. A few seedlings of the 

 plant obtained by ]\Ir. Kopsch, Commissioner of the Chinese 

 Imperial Maritime Customs at Pakhoi, were grown in the Hong 

 Kong gardens and flowered in November, 1886, when the plants 

 had attained the height of 9 feet. Some seedlings sent by Mr. 

 Ford to Kew in 1883, flowered at Kew in 1887, and from these 

 the excellent plate given in the Botanical Magazine was drawn."* 

 Sir Joseph Hooker describes the plant as a new and hitherto 

 undescribed species and points out that it must be placed in quite 

 a different section of the genus from that to which /. anisatum, L., 

 belongs, since it has broad obtuse perianth segments and the 

 peduncles are not bracteate at the base. The fruit is as represented 

 by Gcertner, I. anisatum, Carpologict, vol. i., p. 338, t. 69. 



The stellately arranged, boat-shaped carpels of most commercial 

 specimens of /. verum are eight in number, and although each is 

 furnished with a beak when growing, in the commercial article 

 they are almost invariably broken off. 



The character mentioned by Gsertner as distinguishing the 

 Chinese drug, viz., that the apex of the carpel is pressed in or 

 extended horizontally, is not a distinguishing feature. In the 

 yoLing state of the fruit all the carpels are erect, but spread out- 

 wards as they arrive at maturity ; hence, the position of the beak 

 will differ according to the degree of ripeness of the fruit when 

 gathered. In many specimens of the Chinese drug it will be found 

 pointing upwards. The notch or depression close to the beak just 

 at the end of the upper or ventral edge of the carpel i? more 

 shallow in the Chinese drug than in the Japanese, and the fruit is 

 generally larger by about one -third and has more of the carpels 

 developed to their full size than the Japanese fruit. 



It has been observed that the fruit of the Japanese star anise 

 when wetted and laid on a piece of blue paper reddens it 



