36 VEGETABLE SUBSTANCES. 



Shrubby Cotton Gossypium religiosum. 



dimensions and outspreading branches of the African 

 bombax have ensured the favour and reverence in 

 which it is held among a simple people, who, having 

 *' no long drawn aisle or fretted vault" raised for the 

 observances of religion, have consecrated a natural 

 temple under the ample shade of which their gado- 

 man, or priest, delivers his lectures to the assembled 

 audience. The little shrub called G. religiosum, only 

 attaining to three or four feet in height, cannot 

 therefore, by the most ingenious conceit, be made to 

 show any connexion with the custom of the natives of 

 Guinea, and we must consent to leave the origin of its 

 present designation in obscurity. Lamarck calls this 



