TRICHOSANTHUS. 



Stem 5-sided, slightly downy. Tendrils 3-cleft. Leaves broad- 

 cordate, angular, and sometimes lobed, toothed, downy, very various in 

 size. Male flowers racemose, small, white, beautifully fringed. Racemes 

 axillary, erect, longer than the leaves, many-flowered. Female flowers 

 axillary, solitary, short-peduncled, like the male ones. Fruit oval, or 

 oblong, pointed, from 1 to 4? inches long, and from 1 inch to 1^ inch in 

 diameter, till ripe striated with white and green, when ripe red. Seeds 

 involved in a red pulp, lobed. The fruit is reckoned in India an 

 anthelmintic. 



MURICIA. 



Monoecious. Sepals 5, enclosed in an ample undivided 1-flower- 

 ed spatha, subulate, striated, coloured, united at the base. 

 Corolla campanulate ; petals 5, ovate lanceolate, ribbed. Stamens 

 5, triadelphous and syngenesious. Style 1 ; stigmas 3, sagittate, 

 horizontal. Berry muricated, 1-celled, many-seeded. Seeds 

 orbicular, large, reticulated, warted at the edge. 



188. M. cochinchinensis Lour. ft. coch. 596. DC. prodr. 

 iii. 318 China and Cochinchina. 



A large shrub. Stem thick, woody, climbing, with solitary tendrils. 

 Leaves 5-lobed, toothed, smooth, stalked ; the 3 upper lobes acuminate, 

 the 2 lower rather blunt and short. Flower lateral, solitary, pale 

 yellow, on a long stalk. Berry large, reddish purple both jnside and 

 outside, scentless, insipid. Seeds and leaves abstergent and aperient ; 

 employed by the Chinese in obstructions of the liver, tumours, and 

 malignant ulcers. Externally employed in fractures and dislocations &c. 



*#* Von Martius states in his Travels in Brazil, Eng. ed. ii. 101. 

 that the seeds of a climbing plant, with large berries, perhaps akin to 

 Feuiltea, which are known by the name of Castanhos do Sobota, are 

 given pounded, in doses of 2 or 3 drachms, in dyspepsy, and weakness 

 of the organs of digestion. 



