168 



ANACARDIAOEiE. 



doubt this refers to the galls under notice ; they began to be imported 

 into Europe about 172 i, and are noticed by Geoffroy ^ as Oreilles des 

 Indes, but they seem to have soon disappeared from the market. 

 Pereira directed attention to them in 1844, since which time they 

 have formed a regular and abundant article of import both from China 

 and Japan. 



Formation — Chinese galls are vesicular protuberances formed on 

 the leafstalks and branches of the above-mentioned tree, by the 

 puncture of an insect, identified and figured by Doubleday^ as a species 

 of Aphis, and subsequently named provisionally by Jacob Bell ^ 

 A. chinensis. We have no account by any competent observer of 

 their growth ; and as to their development, we can only imagine it 

 from the analogous productions seen in Europe. According to Double- 

 day, it is probable that the female aphis punctures the upper surface of 

 a leaf (more probably leafstalk), the result of the wound being the 

 growth of a hollow expansion in the vegetable tissue. Of this cavity 

 the creature takes possession and brings forth a progeny which lives 

 by puncturing the inner surface of their home, thus much increasing 

 the tendency to a morbid expansion of the soft growing tissue in an 

 outward direction. Meanwhile the neck of the sac-like gall thickens, 

 the aperture contracts and finally closes, imprisoning all the inmates. 

 Here they live and multiply until, as in the case of the pistacia gall of 

 Europe, the sac ruptures and allows of their escape. This, we may 

 imagine, takes place at the period when, after some generations all 

 wingless and perhaps all female (for the female aphis produces for 

 several generations without impregnation), a winged generation is 

 brought forth of both sexes. These may then fiy to other spots, and 

 deposit eggs for a further propagation of their race. 



The galls are collected when their green colour is changing into 

 yellow ; they are then scalded.^ 



Description — The galls are light and hollow, varying in length 

 from 1 to 2| inches, and of extremely diverse and irregular form. The 

 simplest are somewhat egg-shaped, the smaller end being attached to 

 the leafstalk ; but the form is rarely so regular, and more often the 

 body of the gall is distorted by numerous knobby or horn-like protu- 

 berances or branches ; or the gall consists of several lobes uniting in 

 their lower part and gradually attenuated to the point by which the 

 excrescence is attached to the leaf® But though the form is thus vari- 

 able, the structure of these bodies is very characteristic. They are 

 striated towards the base, and completely covered on other parts with 

 a thick, velvety, grey down, which rubbed ofi" on the prominences, dis- 

 plays the reddish-brown colour of the shell itself. The latter is 



^ Mem. de rAcad^mie royale des Sciencea, 

 Paris, 1724. 324.— Also Du Halde, Descrip- 

 tion de V Empire de la Chine, iii. (La Haye, 

 1736) 615—625. "Des Ou Poey tse." 

 The author quotes numerous medicinal 

 applications for these galls. 



2 Pharm. Journ. vii. (1848) 310. 



3 Ibid. X. (1851) 128. 



* Stanisl. Julien et P. Champion, Indus- 

 tries anc. et modernes de l' Empire chinois, 

 1869. 95. 



^ We have once met with gaUs imported 

 from Shanghai which differed from ordi- 

 nary Chinese galls in not being horned, 

 but all of an elongated ovoid form, often 

 pointed at the upper end, and having 

 moreover a strong cheesy smell. They may 

 be derived from Dhtylium racem,osuvi S. 

 et Z. , though they do not perfectly accord 

 with the depressed pear-shaped forms 

 figured by Siebold and Zuccarini (Flora 

 Jaj)onica, tab. 94). 



