435 



" Pericarp. Capsule oval, very large, woody, not bursting, internally separated 

 into from 10 to 14 cells, filled with dry pulp and veith seeds; tlie partitions niemhran- 

 ous and longitudinal. [Page 437.] 



" Seeds numerous, almost bony, kidney-shaped, lodged in friable pulp. 



" Hence you may perceive how much this genus differs from the rest of the mallow 

 tribe. First, by the calyx falling off immediately after flowering; — second, by the 

 number and situation of the filaments at the top of a monadelphous tube; — third, by 

 the number and form of the stigmas ; — fourth, by the woody and close capsule, with 

 its pulp and cells ; — fifth, the compound fingered leaves ; — and sixth, by the tree it- 

 self, which of all hitherto discovered is tl-J most prodigious in the size of its trunk and 

 branches, being as it were the stupendous vegetable monster of Africa. This tree is 

 found in the country of Senegal only, from whence its fruit, with that of the Agilhaid, 

 is sent every year, as an article of commerce, to Egypt. Some of its seeds having been 

 planted there, in a garden, one or two trees were raised, which appear, from Prosper 

 Alpinus, to have attained no remarkable size, nor perhaps to have flowered, if we may 

 judge by the figure in that author, which in every particular, except the fruit, is erro- 

 neous. In the West Indian island of Martinico, a single tree of this kind, already full 

 gi'o\vn, bearing flowers and fruit, is carefully preserved. It was formerly sown there 

 by the negroes. These and similar remarks are detailed, with my authorities, in the 

 communications to the Parisian Academy." 



In the above extracts allusion is made to the immense size of this 

 tree, which has been spoken of as the largest (or rather the broadest) 

 in the world, a title it well merits, as will be seen from the following 

 description.* 



The Baobab has more the appearance of a forest than of a single 

 tree. It is an immense hemispherical mass of foliage, sixty or seventy 

 feet high, and from a hundred and twenty to a hundred and fifty feet 

 in diameter. The main trunk is very short in proportion to its size, 

 being only about ten or twelve feet high ; while it is at least twenty- 

 five feet in diameter. Golberry, in his Travels in Africa, mentions a 

 Baobab the trunk of which measured upwards of thirty-four feet in 

 diameter, and was about thirty feet high. The branches are of con- 

 siderable size, and fifty or sixty feet long ; the central branch rises 

 perpendicularly, the others spread around it in all directions, the low- 



*The Norfolk-Island Pine (called kauri by the New Zealanders) occasionally 

 grows to a large size. Mr. Terry, in his lately-published work on New Zealand, men- 

 tions an extraordinary individual which grows on the eastern coast, near Mercury Bay, 

 which is the largest in New Zealand. " It is called by the natives the Father of the 

 Kauri. Although almost incredible, it measures seventy-five feet in circumference at 

 its base. The height is unknown, for the surrounding forest is so thick, it is impossi- 

 ble to ascertain it accurately. There is an ann some distance up the tree, which mea- 

 sures six feet in diameter at its junction with the parent trunk.'' It is evident 

 that the particular tree here spoken of, far exceeds the average size of the species. 



2 P 2 



