XXV. LEGUMINA^CEA GYMNO'CLADUS. 255 



which it is difficult to say any thing satisfactory in the present young and im- 

 mature state of the plants. In the Hort. Soc. Garden, there were in 1837 

 G. micracdntha, G. Boqui, and G. prce^cox ; and in Messrs. Loddiges's arbo- 

 retum were plants marked G. aqudtica, which are evidently the same as G. 

 monosperma, G. orientalis, evidently G. ferox, G. chinensis (already mentioned) ; 

 and some young plants without names. 



GENUS XXI. 



GYMNO'CLADUS Lam. THE GYMNOCLADUS. Lin. Syst. Dioe'cia 

 Decandria. 



Identification. Lam. Diet., 1. p. 733. ; 111., t. 823. ; Dec. Prod., 2. p. 479. 



Derivation. From gamnos, naked, and klados, a branch ; from the naked appearance of the branches 

 during winter, when they seem, unless perhaps at the points of the shoots, totally devoid of buds. 



Gen. Char. Flowers dioecious from abortion. Calyx tubular, 5-cleft. Petals 

 5, equal, oblong, exserted from the tube. Stamens 10, enclosed. Legume 

 oblong, thick, filled with pulp inside. {Don's Mill.) 



Leaves compound, alternate, stipulate, deciduous; bipinnate. Flowers 

 in terminal racemes, white. A tree, deciduous, with upright branches and 

 inconspicuous buds ; native of North America. 



1. G. CANADE'NSIS Lam. The Canada Gymnocladus, or Kentucky 

 Coffee Tree. 



Identification. Lam. Diet., 1. p. 733., and 111., t. 823. ; Michx. Fl. Bor. Amer., 2. p. 241.; Dec. 

 Prod., 2. p. 480. ; Don's Mill., 2. p. 429. 



Synonymes. Guilandlno dioica Lin. Sp. 546.; Hypernnthera dioica Vahl Symb. 1. p 31., Duh. 

 Arb. 1. t. 103. ; Nicker Tree, Stump Tree, United States; Bonduc, Chiquier, Fr. ; Chicot, Ca- 

 nadian ; Canadischer Schusserbaum, Ger. 



Engravings. Reich. Mag., t. 40. ; Duh. Arb., t. 103. ; our plates of this tree in Arb. Brit., 1st edit., 

 vol. v. ; and our fig. 418. 



Spec. Char., $c. Branches blunt at the tip, bipinnate leaves, flowers in ra- 

 cemes, and whitish petals. The leaf has 47 pinna? ; the lower of which 

 consist each of but a single leaflet, the rest each of 6 8 pairs of leaflets. 

 (Dec Prod.) A singular tree. Canada. Height 30 ft. to 60 ft. Introduced 

 in 1748. Flowers white; May to July. Decaying leaves yellow. Naked 

 young wood of a mealy white, without any appearance of buds. 

 The branches have almost always an upright direction j and the appearance 

 of the head, in the winter season, is remarkable, from being fastigiate, and from 

 the points of the branches being few, and thick and blunt, as compared with 

 those of almost every other tree. They are also wholly without the ap- 

 pearance of buds ; and this latter circumstance, connected with the former, 

 gives the tree, during winter, the appearance of being dead ; and hence the 

 Canadian name of chicot, or stump tree. The leaves, on young thriving trees, 

 are 3 ft. long, and 20 in. wide ; but, on trees nearly full grown, they are not 

 half that size. The leaflets are of a dull bluish green, and the branches of 

 the petioles are somewhat of a violet colour. It is very hardy, and flowers 

 freely in the neighbourhood of London, but does not produce pods. The 

 wood is hard, compact, strong, tough, and of a fine rose colour. In America, 

 it is used both in cabinet-making and carpentry, and, like the wood of the 

 robinia, it has the remarkable property of rapidly converting its sap-wood into 

 heart- wood j so that a trunk Gin. in diameter has not more than six lines of 

 sap-wood, and may, consequently, be almost entirely employed for useful pur- 

 poses. The seeds were, at one time, roasted and ground as a substitute for 

 coffee in Kentucky and Tennessee ; but their use in this way has been long 

 since discontinued. The pods, preserved like those of the tamarind (to which 



