704 SMILACEtE. 



1. Smilax ofjicinalis H.B.K. — This plant was obtained in the year 

 1805, by Humboldt, at Bajorque, a village since swept away by the 

 stream, about in 7° N. lat., on the Magdalena in New Granada. The 

 specimens, comprising only a few imperfect leaves, which we have 

 examined in the National Herbarium of Paris, are the materials upon 

 which Kunth founded the species. Humboldt^ states, that quantities 

 of the root are shipped by way of Mompox and Cartagena to Jamaica 

 and Cadiz. 



In 1853 this plant was again gathered at Bajorque by the late De 

 Warszewicz, who sent to one of us (H.) leaves and stems, accompanied 

 by the root, which latter agrees with the Jamaica Saraaparilla of 

 commerce. But at Bajorque the root is no longer collected for 

 exportation. 



The same botanical collector, at the request of one of us, obtained in 

 the year 1851, on the volcano and Cordillera of Chiriqui in Costa Rica, 

 fruits, leaves, stems, and roots, of the plant there collected by the Indians 

 as Sarsa peluda or Sarson. These specimens agree, so far as comparison 

 is possible, with those of the Bajorque plant, while the root is undistin- 

 guishable from the Jamaica sarsaparilla of the shops. Other specimens 

 of the same plant, gathered by the same collector in 1853, were for- 

 warded to England with a living root, which latter however could not 

 be made to grow. 



Finally, in 1869, Mr. R B. White obligingly communicated to us 

 leaves and roots of a sarsaparilla collected at Patia in New Granada, 

 which apparently belongs to the same species. 



In the island of Jamaica, there has been cultivated for many years, 

 and of late with a view to medicinal use, a sarsaparilla plant which 

 appears to be Smilax offi^cinalis. The specimens transmitted to us '" 

 include neither flowers nor fruits ; but the leaves and square stem 

 accord exactly with those of the plant collected at Bajorque. The root 

 is of a light cinnamon-brown, and far more amylaceous than the so- 

 called Jamaica Sarsaparilla of commerce (see p. 710). 



2. Smilax medica Schl. et Cham. — This species,^ which was 

 discovered in Mexico by Schiede in 1820, is without doubt the source 

 of the sarsaparilla shipped from Vera Cruz. According to our observa- 

 tions, it has a flexuose (or zigzag) stem, and much smaller foliage than 

 S. officinalis; the leaves, though very variable, often assume an 

 auriculate form, with broad, obtuse, basal lobes. 



It grows on the eastern slopes of the Mexican Andes, and is the 

 only species of that region of which the roots are collected. These, 

 according to Schiede, are dug up all the year round, dried in the sun 

 and made into bundles, 



1 Kunth, Synopsis Plant, i. (1822) 278. — enclosing an elliptic area. The flowers are 



Smilax officinalis is a large, strong climber, in stalked umbels. A fine specimen of the 



attaining a height of 40 to 50 feet, with a plant is most luxuriantly growing since 



perfectly square stem armed with prickles many years in the Royal Gardens, Kew, 



at the angles. The leaves are often a foot but has not flowered, 



in length, of variable form, being triangular, - We owe them to the kindness of H. J. 



ovate-oblong, or oblong-lanceolate, either Kemble, Esq., who procured them, with 



gradually narrowing towards the apex or specimens of the root, from the Government 



rounded and apiculate, and at the base garden at Castleton. 



either attenuated into the petiole, or trun- * Figured in Nees von Esenbeck's Plantce 



cate, or cordate. They are usually 5-nerved, Medicinales, suppl. tab. 7. 

 the 3 inner nerves being prominent and 



