450 NOTES OF A BOTANIST 



it in Brazil, but under another name and prepared 

 in a different way. There it is called guarana, and 

 is largely cultivated in the mid-Amazon region, 

 especially on the river Mauhes, which is a little 

 west of the Tapajoz, whence it is exported to all 

 other parts of Brazil. Single plants of it may 

 be seen in gardens and ro9as all the way up the 

 Amazon, as far as to the Peruvian frontier ; and 

 throughout the Rio Negro. Martius's excellent 

 account of the Guarana of the Mauhes has been 

 translated by Mr. Bentham in Hooker's Journal of 

 Botany for July 1851. Martius called the plant 

 Paullinia sorbilis, apparently not suspecting it to 

 be the same as Humboldt's Paullinia Ciipana ; yet 

 the two are absolutely identical, and Humboldt's 

 name, being the elder, must stand. 



The specimens distributed by Mr. Bentham in 

 my Plantae Exsiccatae (No. 2055) were gathered 

 at Uanauaca, a farm on the Rio Negro, a little 

 below the cataracts. I subjoin the brief description 

 I drew up on the spot. 



PAULLINIA CUPANA, H. B. K., Nov. Gen. Amer. v. p. 117 ; 



DC. Prodr. i. 605. 



Synon. PauUinia sorl'ilis, Mart., J?eise, ii. p. 1098; ejusdem 

 Syst. Mat. Med. Brazil, p. 59 ; Th. Mart, in Buchner's Repcrt. 

 d. Pliann. xxxi. p. 370. 



Description. Stout woody twiner, kept down in cultivation to 

 the size of a compact currant bush. Ramuli and petioles sub- 

 pubescent. Leaves alternate, pinnate; leaflets two and a half 

 pairs, 5-J x 2-g- inches, oval, sub-acuminate, grossly and obtusely 

 serrate, the apical tooth retuse, nearly smooth. Racemes axillary, 

 with small white flowers in stalked clusters. Fruit (capsule) 

 yellow, passing to red at the top, obovato-pyriform, tapering below 

 into long neck (quasi-stipitate), at apex shortly rostrate, i T 7 g- inch 

 long (neck ^ inch, beak ] inch); pericarp thinnish, soft, glabrous 

 externally, densely tomentose on the inner surface, 3-valved, 

 but dehiscing along only two of the sutures, the third remaining 

 closed, by abortion i -celled, i -seeded. Seed ovato -globose, 



