1028 CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM. 



Tree, sometimes 25 meters high, with a trunk 1.2 meters in diameter, but 

 usually much smaller; bark thin, brownish gray, shallowly furrowed, red 

 within ; leaves opposite, petiolate, obovate or elliptic, 5 to 15 cm. long, obtuse, 

 entire, leathery, glabrous, dark green, with deciduous stipules ; flowers perfect, 

 on 2 or 3-flowered axillary peduncles ; calyx leathery, 4-lobed ; petals 4, yel- 

 lowish white, linear, hairy ; stamens 8 ; fruit baccate, conic, 2 to 2.5 cm. long, 

 leathery, brown ; seed usually germinating in the fruit, the radicle pushing 

 out and growing downward, becoming 25 to 30 cm. long before it falls from 

 the plant and takes root in the mud ; wood hard, close-grained, strong, dark 

 red-brown, its specific gravity about 1.16. " Tab-che " or " tap-ch6 " (Yucatan, 

 Maya); "mangle" (Baja California, Oaxaca, and elsewhere, Costa Rica, 

 Porto Rico, Santo Domingo, etc. ; the word probably of Carib origin ; " manglar " 

 is a mangrove thicket) ; "mangle dulce " (Baja California) ; "mangle Colo- 

 rado" (Tabasco, Tamaulipas, Oaxaca, Veracruz, Guerrero, Cuba, Panama, 

 Guatemala, Porto Rico, Venezuela) ; "mangle tinto " (Veracruz) ; "candelon" 

 (Veracruz, Colima, Sinaloa, Ramirez) ; "mangle salado " (Panama) ; "mangle 

 zapatero" (Porto Rico); "mangle gateador " (Costa Rica). 



The mangrove (sometimes known as "red mangrove") is the most abundant 

 and conspicuous tree of tropical coasts, forming dense forests or thickets of 

 great extent almost everj^vhere that the water is brackish. The plants send 

 out numerous arching prop roots in all directions, which are covered at 

 high tide, and these form impenetrable tangles. The roots are often covered 

 with oysters. The mangrove is important in land building, preventing wash- 

 ing away of land by waves and also affording a place of protection for soil 

 and refuse. Thus small islands gradually increase greatly in size. The soil 

 underneath mangrove trees usually consists of black oozy mud, and the man- 

 grove forests are extremely repellent in appearance when seen at close hand, 

 although when viewed from a distance they are strikingly handsome. 



The wood is used for fuel and for building wharfs and docks, since it is 

 durable in water and is not attacked by the moUusk Teredo. Clavigero states 

 that it was employed for making oars, and Oviedo states that " it is one of 

 the best woods there is here (West Indies) for the poles of huts and timbers 

 of houses, and for door and window frames." The leaves and especially 

 the bark are rich in tannin and the latter is used for tanning leather. The 

 bark, with salts of copper or iron, yields olive, brown, and slate dyes. Of 

 the fruit, Oviedo (Lib. IX, Cap. VI) states that it "is tawny and within 

 is a marrow or heart which the Indians eat when they can find no better 

 fruit (for it is somewhat bitter), and they say it is wholesome." The bark 

 has been employed as a febrifuge and to stop hemorrhages, also as a remedy 

 for sore throat. Pittier reports that in Panama a red dye is obtained from the 

 young shoots. 



121. COMBRETACEAE. Combretum Family. 



Trees or shrubs, sometimes scandent, in some genera armed with spines; 

 leaves opposite or alternate, entire, estipulate; flowers spicate, racemose, or 

 capitate, bracteate, perfect or polygamo-dioecious ; calyx tube adnate to the 

 ovary, the limb 4 or 5-lobate, the lobes usually valvate; petals 4 or 5 or 

 none, small ; stamens as many or twice as many as the calyx lobes, inserted on 

 the limb or base of the calyx ; style simple, the stigma entire ; fruit coriaceous 

 or drupaceous, 1-celled, 1-seeded, indehiscent. 



