RUBIACES. SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 105 
EXOSTEMA CARIBAIUM. 
Prince Wood. 
FLOWERS on simple axillary peduncles. 
ceous. 
Leaves oblong-ovate to lanceolate, coria- 
Exostema Caribzoum, Roemer & Schultes, Syst. v. 18 Hist. Stirp. Am. 61, t. 179, £. 95; Obs. Bot. ii. 27, t. 47; 
(1819). — Hayne, Arzn. vii. t. 44. — Sprengel, Syst. i. 
705.— De Candolle, Prodr. iv. 359.— Don, Gen. Syst. 
iii. 481. — Dietrich, Syn. i. 722. —Spach, Hist. Vég. viii. 
394. — Torrey & Gray, Fl. N. Am. ii. 36.— A. Richard, 
Fl. Cub. iii. 5. — Chapman, F7. 180. — Grisebach, FV. 
Brit. W. Ind. 324; Cat. Pl. Cub. 125. — Gray, Syn. 
Fl. N. Am. i. pt. ii. 23. —Sargent, Forest Trees N. Am. 
10th Census U. S. ix. 95.— Hitchcock, Rep. Missouri 
Hist. Select. Stirp. Am. 35, t. 64. — Linneus, Spee. ed. 
2, 245. — Icon. Am. Gewiich. i. 11, t. 33. — Swartz, Obs. 
72. — Vahl, Skriv. Nat. Selsk. i. 21; Symbd. ii. 37.— 
Gertner, Fruct. i. 169, t. 33. — Willdenow, Spec. i. pt. ii. 
959. — Gmelin, Syst. Nat. ii. 361. — Lambert, Cinchona, 
38, t. 12 (excl. syn.). — Poiret, Lam. Dict. vi. 35; Ill. ii. 
261, t. 164, f. 4. — Andrews, Bot. Rep. vii. t. 481. — 
Lunan, Hort. Jam. i. 391. 
Bot. Gard. iv. 92. 
Cinchona Caribea, Jacquin, Hnum. Pl. Carib. 16 (1760) ; 
Cinchona Jamaicensis, Wright, Phil. Trans. Ixvii. 504, 
t. 10 (1778). 
A glabrous tree, in Florida sometimes twenty to twenty-five feet in height, with a trunk ten or 
twelve inches in diameter, slender erect branches which form a narrow head, and terete branchlets ; 
or often a shrub only a few feet high. The bark of the trunk is an eighth of an inch thick and is 
divided by deep fissures into square smooth pale or nearly white plates. The branchlets, when they 
first appear, are dark green, but soon become dark red-brown and covered with pale lenticels, and in 
their second year are ashy gray and rather conspicuously marked by the elevated leaf-scars. The leaves 
are oblong-ovate to lanceolate, contracted into slender points and apiculate at the apex, wedge-shaped 
and gradually narrowed at the base into long slender orange-colored petioles, entire, thick and coria- 
ceous, dark green on the upper surface and yellow-green on the lower, an inch and a half to three 
inches long and half an inch to an inch and a quarter broad, with prominent orange-colored midribs 
slightly impressed on the upper side and conspicuous reticulate veins ; they appear in the autumn and 
in early spring and summer, and remain on the branches for one or two years. The stipules are a 
sixteenth of an inch long, nearly triangular and apiculate, with entire, dentate, or ciliate margins, 
and in falling mark the branchlets with ring-like scars. The flowers, which appear from March until 
June, are borne on one-flowered axillary peduncles and are exceedingly fragrant; they are three inches 
long, with an ovate calyx-tube, persistent nearly triangular calyx-lobes, a glabrous corolla, and filaments 
united at the base into a short tube. The fruit is cylindrical, two thirds of an inch long and dark 
brown, becoming black in drying. The seed is oblong and an eighth of an inch long, with a dark 
brown papillose coat and a light brown wing. 
Exostema Caribeum is scattered over the keys of southern Florida and is common on Key West 
and Upper Metacombe Keys; it inhabits the West Indies, southern Mexico, and the west coast of 
Nicaragua.’ 
The wood of Exostema Caribeum is very heavy, exceedingly hard, strong, and close-grained, 
with a satiny surface susceptible of receiving a beautiful polish; it contains numerous obscure 
medullary rays, and is light brown handsomely streaked with different shades of yellow and brown, the 
bright yellow sapwood being composed of twelve to twenty layers of annual growth. The specific 
gravity of the absolutely dry wood is 0.9310, a cubic foot weighing 58.02 pounds. 
Exostema Curibeum was first detected in Florida on Key West by Dr. J. L. Blodgett. 
1 Hemsley, Bot. Biol. Am. Cent. ii. 13. 
