LEGUMINOS 2. 
60 SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 
Orient,’ in southern Asia® where ten species occur, in China® and Japan,‘ Australia,’ New Zealand, 
It once existed in Europe, where 
traces of Sophora Huropcea are common in the rocks of the lower Miocene period.” 
In China a drug prepared from the roots and leaves 
the Hawaiian Islands,’ Chile,* and tropical’ and southern Africa.” 
The genus has not many useful properties. 
of Sophora tomentosa is used in large quantities as a tonic and diuretic ; and a yellow dye is made 
from the pods of Sophora Japonica, while the flower-buds of this species, which form an important 
article of commerce, are used to dye cloth yellow and blue cloth green, and in astringent remedies.” 
The leaves have been successfully used, it is said, as a cathartic. The seeds of the Texas and Mexi- 
ean Sophora secundiflora contain a poisonous alkaloid, Sophoria, which possesses strong narcotic 
properties, and are believed to have supplied the Indians of Texas with a means of intoxication.* The 
Hawaiian Sophora chrysophylla” produces hard, durable, and very valuable timber, and the wood of 
the New Zealand and Chilian Sophora tetraptera”™ is distinguished for its great strength, toughness, 
and elasticity.” 
Many species of Sophora are valuable ornamental plants. Sophora Japonica, which was one of 
the first Asiatic trees introduced into Europe, is now a familiar inhabitant of the gardens and parks 
of all temperate regions, and several species of the section Edwardsia, natives of New Zealand, Chile, 
and the Hawanan Islands, and distinguished principally by their winged legumes, are sometimes 
cultivated in European gardens,” where the Indian Sophora glauca™ and S. heptaphylla™ are also 
occasionally seen. 
1 Bunge, Boissier Fl. Orient. ii. 628, 629 (Gebelia and Keyser- 
lingia). 
2 Wight & Arnott, Prodr. Fl. Ind. 179. —Thwaites, Enum. Pl. 
Zeylan. 94. — Hooker f. Fi. Brit. Ind. ii. 248. 
8 Franchet, Pl. David. i. 100.— Hemsley, Jour. Linn. Soc. xxiii. 
201. 
4 Thunberg, Fl. Jap. 178. — Miquel, Prol. Fl. Jap. 241. — Max- 
imowicz, Bull. Acad. Sci. St. Pétersbourg, xviii. 398 (Mel. Biol. ix. 
71). — Franchet & Savatier, Enum. Pl. Jap. i. 118. 
5 Bentham, FU. Austral. ii. 274. 
® Hooker f. Fl. New Zealand, i. 52. 
7 Hillebrand, Fl. Haw. Js. 108. 
8 C. Gay, Fl. Chil. ii. 214 (Edwardsia). 
® Oliver, Fl. Trop. Afr. ii. 253. 
10 Harvey & Sonder, Fl. Cap. ii. 265. 
1 Saporta, Origine Paléontologique des Arbres, 314. 
12 Smith, Chinese Mat. Med. 202.— Maiden, Useful Native Plants 
of Australia, 204. 
18 Smith, /. c. 201. 
14H. C. Wood, Phil. Med. Times, Aug. 4, 1877. — Rothrock, Bot. 
Gazette, ii. 133. — Nat. Dispens. ed. 2, 18333. — Havard, Proc. U.S. 
Nat. Aus. viii. 500. 
15 Seemann, Fi. Vit. 66.— Hillebrand, Fl. Haw. Is. 108. 
Edwardsia chrysophylla, Salisbury, Trans. Linn. Soc. ix. 299, t. 
26, f. 1. 
16 Aiton, Hort Kew. ii. 43.— Bot. Mag. 167.— Nouveau Duha- 
mel, iii. 82, t. 20. 
1 Kirk, Forest Fl. New Zealand, 84, t. 50, 51, 52. 
18 Linneus, Mant. 68.— Nouveau Duhamel, iii. 84, t. 21. — De 
Candolle, Prodr. ii. 95.— Miquel, Prol. Fl. Jap. 241.— Franchet 
& Savatier, Enum. Pl. Jap. i. 113. — Franchet, Pl. David. i. 100. — 
Hemsley, Jour. Linn. Soc. xxiii. 202. 
S. Sinica, Trochereau, Jour. Phys. xiv. 248. 
Styphnolobium Japonicum, Schott, Wien. Zeitschr. 1830, 844. 
Sophora Japonica was sent to Europe from China by the Pere 
d’Incarville in 1747 (Guerrapain, Notice sur la Culture du Sophora, 
du Platane et de l’Aune. — Desfontaines, Hist. Arb. ii. 258) and 
was planted by Bernard de Jussieu in the garden of the Petit 
Trianon several years before it reached England, where it was in- 
troduced by the nurseryman James Gordon in 1753 (Aiton, Hort. 
Kew. ii. 45). 
the Maréchal de Noailles at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, and in the 
It first flowered in Europe in 1779 in the garden of 
same year in that of the Petit Trianon at Versailles. 
Sophora Japonica appears to be indigenous to northern, central, 
and western China, and is cultivated on a considerable scale in some 
parts of the empire for its flower-buds. It is supposed to have 
been introduced into Japan, where, however, Rein (Japan nach 
Reisen und Studien im Auftrage der Kéniglich Preussischen Regier- 
ung, li. 297) found it scattered over the entire country, especially 
in the broad-leaved forests of the north. 
In the United States, where Sophora Japonica is hardy as far 
north as eastern New England, and in Europe, it forms a handsome 
tree sometimes forty or fifty feet in height, with 4 dense broad 
It is 
valuable as an ornamental plant from the fact that its white flow- 
head of bright green branches and dark lustrous foliage. 
ers, produced in loose panicles at the end of the branches, appear 
in August when few trees are in blossom. A variety with pendu- 
lous branches is common in gardens (Loudon, Arb. Brit. ii. 564, t.). 
The wood of Sophora Japonica is pale brown, tough, and durable, 
although light and coarse-grained, the layers of annual growth 
When first cut it 
possesses cathartic properties which make it dangerous to work 
being marked by broad bands of open cells. 
until thoroughly seasoned (Nouveau Duhamel, l. c.). 
19 Bot. Mag. t. 1442, 3735. — Bot. Reg. 738, 1798. — Gard. Chron. 
u. ser. ix. 729.— Nicholson, Dict. Gard.— Naudin, Manuel de 
l’Acclimateur, 502. 
20 De Candolle, Ann. Sci. Nat. iv. 98 ; Prodr. ii. 95. — Hooker 
f. Fl. Brit. Ind. ii. 249. 
S. velutina, Lindley, Bot. Reg. t. 1185. 
21 Linnzus, Spec. 373. — De Candolle, 7. c. 96. — Hooker f. 1. ¢. 
250. 
