1277 



Mr. Adn. Hernandez, Director, Bureau of Agriculture. 

 "This, like the mangosteen, is a delicious Oriental 

 fruit not yet well established in America. While it 

 is not as famous as the mangosteen, it is highly es- 

 teemed throughout the Malayan region and is praised 

 by many travelers. Judging from our limited experience 

 with it, the langsat is slightly hardier than the man- 

 gosteen, and there seems to be no reason why it should 

 not succeed with us. A few plants have been grown in 

 the West Indies and other parts of the American tropics, 

 but I have yet to hear of its fruiting outside the 

 Orient. The langsat has two allies in America: one the 

 well-known umbrella tree (Melia azedarach) of the United 

 States; the other the tropical mahogany (Swietenia) . 

 The genus Lansium, to which the langsat belongs, is a 

 small one; and is the only one cultivated for its fruit. 

 The duku, a fruit closely resembling the langsat, is com- 

 monly considered a botanical variety of L. domesticum. 

 The tree is rather slender in habit, with a straight 

 trunk and compound leaves composed of 3 or more pairs 

 of elliptic to obovate leaflets 3 or 4 inches in length. 

 The fruits, which ripen in the Straits Settlements 

 from July to September, are produced in small clusters; 

 in general appearance they suggest large loquats, the 

 surface being straw-colored and slightly downy. The 

 skin is thick and leathery and does not adhere to the 

 white translucent flesh which separates into 5 segments. 

 Each segment normally contains an oval seed, but some 

 of the segments in each fruit are usually seedless. 

 The flavor is highly aromatic, at times slightly pun- 

 gent. The fruit is commonly eaten while fresh but it 

 is said also to be utilized in various other ways. 

 The name lanzon is applied to this fruit in the Philip- 

 pine Islands, langsat or langseh being the form used in 

 the Malay Peninsula." (Wilson Popenoe.) 



Passiflora ligularis (Passif loraceae) , 45614. From 

 Caracas, Venezuela. Presented by Mr. H. Pittier. "Un- 

 questionably one of the best of the granadillas. In Guat- 

 emala it is common at elevations of 4,000 to 7,000 

 feet, but I have never seen it in the lowlands; it 

 appears therefore, that it is adapted to subtropical 

 climates, and judging from its presence in portions of 

 Guatemala almost too cold for the avocados, I feel that 

 it ought to succeed in California. The behavior of 

 other species, such as P. edulis , in that state indi- 

 cates that conditions in general are favorable to the 

 passifloras, and the question has generally been one 



