Northern Porliera 



56s 



blue petals; the slender filaments are 

 not appendagcd. The fruit is an obo- 

 void rather fleshy capsule, strongly 

 five-angled, 17 mm. long or less, short- 

 stalked in the persistent base of the ca- 

 lyx, bright orange when ripe; it con- 

 tains black clHptic seeds provided with 

 a scarlet aril. 



The dense resinous wood is heavier 

 than water, its specific gravity being 

 about I.I 5; in color it varies from light 

 yellow to greenish, the heartwood being 

 much darker than the sapwood; it is 

 sometimes called Ironwood. 



The wood, on account of the resin, 

 is used medicinally as a diaphoretic 

 and alterative, like that of its more 



Fig. 521. Lignum Vitse. 



southern relative G. officinale, the resin of which, however, is preferred. 



NORTHERN PORLIERA 



GENUS PORLIERA RUIZ AND PAVON 



Species Porliera angustifolia (Engelmann) A. Gray 



Giiaiacum angustifoliitm Engelmann 



ORLIERA contains several species of shrubs and trees, distributed 

 from the Sonoran region to Chile; they differ from Guaiacums in 

 having filaments which are appendaged by 

 a scale, and their leaflets are narrow. The 

 generic name commemorates Porher de Baxamar, a 

 Spanish patron of Botany. The type species is the 

 South American Porliera hygrometra Ruiz and Pavon. 

 Porliera angustifolia inhabits plains or prairies in 

 Texas and northern Mexico. While usually a shrub, it 

 sometimes becomes a tree up to 7 meters in height, 

 with a trunk up to 2.5 dm, thick, its branches spread- 

 ing or straggling. The leaves have from 4 to 6 pairs 

 of linear coriaceous leaflets, and are short-stalked 

 and smooth; the leaflets are 1.5 cm. long or less, 2 to 

 3 mm. wide, distinctly netted- veined, minutely tipped, Uf^ . v^' 

 somewhat obUque at the sessile base. The flowers are t/^ 



borne at the ends of short branches and are i to 2 cm. Fig. 522. Northern Porliera. 

 broad; the concave round sepals are about 5 mm. long, half as long as the ellip- 



