CINCHONACEJE. 



plants or shrubs, with slender twining stems, and axillary 1 -many- 

 flowered peduncles. 



862. M. cordifolia Mart. spec. mat. med. bras. i. 19. t. 7. DC. 

 prodr. iv. 363. Bot. mag. t. 3202. M. glabra Cham, and 

 Schlecht. Linncea 1829. p. 159. DC. prodr. iv. 363. Buenos 

 Ayres ; banks of the Arroyo de la China, a stream that enters 

 the Uruguay entre Rios. Hedges in the province of the Mines 

 in Brazil, near Villa Rica and elsewhere. 



Whole plant glabrous. Stem sufFruticose, much branched, very 

 slender, round, twining ; bark grey and exfoliating, on the young shoots 

 green, glabrous, shining. Leaves (2 inches long, 1 inch broad, but 

 gradually smaller, and the uppermost about 4 lines long, 2 lines broad, 

 while the low and largest on a vigorous cultivated specimen, are 4 inches 

 long, and nearly 2 broad,) opposite, petioled, cordate, acuminate, 

 glabrous on both sid'es, shining, pale, with prominent veins and obscure 

 minute reticulations, below dark, and the veins slightly channelled 

 above. Stipules small, subulate, and at length often reflexed in their 

 upper half, bases broad and connate within the petioles, so as to form 

 a small cup, which is occasionally toothed, round the branch. Pedun- 

 cles elongated, solitary, glabrous, filiform, shining and single-flowered, 

 at the extremities of the branches, which are subsequently elongated, 

 rendering the peduncle axillary. Calyx green, glabrous, 4-parted, with 

 minute, divided intervening teeth ; segments acute, at length reflected, 

 1-nerved. Corolla (fully 1 inch long, 3^ lines across the revolute 

 limb,) very handsome, shining on the outer surface, and glabrous every 

 where, except a little above its base on the inside, where for some 

 distance it is densely clothed with inverted, white hairs ; tube clavate- 

 funnel-shaped, with 4 flat sides, nectariferous, and only colourless at 

 the base, every other part of the corolla vermilion orange-coloured, 

 deepest on the inner side of the limb, green in the young buds, throat 

 dilated and naked; limb 4-parted, segments deltoid, revolute. Sta- 

 mens 4, alternating with the segments of the corolla ; filaments colour- 

 less, adhering to the tube throughout its whole length, the free portion 

 slightly connivent, and rather shorter than the segments of the limb ; 

 anthers versatile, oblong, purple, inserted by their back, bursting along 

 the front of the cells, which are distant in the middle, connivent at the 

 extremities ; pollen green. Ovary inferior, green, compressed, bilo- 

 cular, crowned by a white depressed disk, which rises above the inser- 

 tion of the corolla." Style rather longer than the stamens, exserted, 

 colourless, filiform. Stigma green, blunt, of 2, erect, parallel lobes. 

 Ovules numerous, erect, on erect, free, columnar receptacles, one rising 

 with each loculament from near the base of the dissepiment. Capsule 

 ovate, compressed, channelled on both sides, crowned by the persisting, 

 indurated calyx, bivalvular, bilocular, opening by a division of the 

 dissepiment ; valves boat-shaped, nerved, and each splitting into 2 teeth 

 at the apex. Seeds brown, round, flattened, and surrounded by a 

 membranous wing. Hooker. The bark of the root is esteemed in 

 Brazil a most valuable remedy in dropsy and dysentery. It is given in 

 powder in doses of. ^ to H drachm. It acts as an emetic. 



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