20 MAGNOLIACEiE. 



time.^ It is the bark figured as Cortex Winteranus by Goebel and 

 Kunze^ and described by Merat and De Lens/ Pereira, and other writers 

 of repute. Guibourt indeed pointed out in 1850 its great dissimilarity 

 to the bark of Driviys and questioned if it could be derived from that 

 genus. 



It is a strano-e fact that the tree should have been confounded with 



o 



Canella alba L., differing from it as it does in the most obvious manner, 

 not only in form of leaf, but in having the flowers axillary, whereas 

 those of C. alba are terminal. Although Ginnamodendron corticosum 

 is a tree sometimes as much as 90 feet high^ and must have been well 

 known in Jamaica for more than a century, yet it had no botanical 

 name until 1858 when it was described by Miers' and referred to the 

 small genus Cinnamodendron which is closely allied to Canella. 



The bark of Cinnamodendron has the general structure of Canella 

 alba. There is the same thin corky outer coat (which is not removed) 

 dotted with round scars, the same form of quills and fracture. But the 

 tint is different, being more or less of a ferruginous brown. The inner 

 surface which is a little more fibrous than in canella, varies in colour, 

 being yellowish, brown, or of a deep chocolate. The bark is violently 

 pungent but not bitter, and has a very agreeable cinnamon-like odoin\ 



In microscopic structure it approaches very close to canella ; yet 

 the thick- walled cells of the latter exist to a much larger extent and 

 are here seen to belong to the suberous tissue. The medullary raj's are 

 loaded with oxalate of calcium. 



Cinnamodendron bark has not been analysed. Its decoction is 

 blackened by a persalt of iron whereby it may be distinguished from 

 Canella alba ; and is coloured intense purplish brown by iodine, which 

 is not the case with a decoction of true Winter's Bark. 



FRUCTUS ANISI STELLATI. 



Semen Badiana*^; Star-Anise ; F. Badiane, Anis ^toiU; G. Steimanis. 



Botanical Origin — Illicium anisatum Loureiro (/. religiosum 

 Sieb.). A small tree, 20 to 25 feet high, native of the south-western 

 provinces of China ; introduced at an early period into Japan by the 

 Buddhists and planted about their temples. 



Kampfer in his travels in Japan, in 1690 — 1692, discovered and 

 figured a tree called Somo or SJcimmi'' which subsequent authors 

 assumed to be the source of the drug Star-anise. The tree was also 

 found in Japan by Thunberg* who remarked that its capsules are not 

 so aromatic as tho.se found in trade. Von Siebold in 1825 noticed the 



1 It is so labelled in the Museum of the * Griesbach calls it a low shrubby tree. 



Pharmaceutical Society, 28th April, 1873. 10—15 feet high. Mr. N. Wilson, late of 



"^PJiarm. Waarenkunde, 1827-29. i. Taf. the Bath Botanic Garden, Jamaica, has in 



3. fig. 7. formed me it grows to be 40 — 45 in height, 



■" As shown by De Lens' own specimen but that he has seen a specimen 90 feet 



kmdly given to us by Dr. J. Leon Soubei- high. (Letter 22 May 1862.)— D. H. 

 ran. There are specimens of the same ' Loc. c'U. 



bark about a century old marked Cortex « From the Arabic Bddii/dn fennel. 



Winteranus verus in Dr. Burges's cabinet ^ Amcenitates, 1712. 880". 



of drugs belonging to the Royal College of ^ Flora Japonka, 1784. 235. 



Physicians. 



