150 NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



Wall. 1 is one of the most magnificent ornamental trees known, and 

 the Browneas, 2 with their numerous coloured bracts, are not far 

 behind it in beauty. It is to be hoped that the genera Afzelia and 

 Berlinia may be cultivated in our hothouses, for their splendid 

 corollas are exquisitely scented. 3 Scholia blooms pretty often under 

 our cultivation. 4 Saraca is grown in the gardens of India, owing 

 to the beauty of its petaloid calyx. Many yellow-flowered perennial 

 Cassias are bedded out in our summer parterres. The so-called 

 Flamboyants or Flame-trees of India and the islands east of tropical 

 Africa, "are all prized for their conspicuous red flowers. Of these 

 some are true species of Poinciana? and the remaining two are 

 Colvillea racemosa, 6 of Madagascar, and Ccesaljrinia pulcherrima, 7 now 

 found in all hot countries. Indeed all the arborescent species of 

 CcBsalpiniea are ornamental ; and C. Gilliesii* often flowers in our 

 gardens. Cadia varia has pretty pinkish flowers, something like 

 those of the Mallow. 9 Species of Cercis (Judas Tree ; Fr., Gamier, 

 Bois de Judee), Gymnocladus, and GleditscMa are often planted in our 

 parks and gardens, and are prized, the former for their precocious 

 flowers, the latter for their foliage, and the peculiar look of their 

 enormous branching spines. 



Lindley showed that the chief property of Casatpiniea is that of 

 purging. 10 This is especially marked in the grenus Cassia, 11 which in 

 this respect may be distinguished into two groups, Cathartocarpus 

 and Senna. The former supplies us with the drug Cassia (Casse), 

 the latter with Senna {Sene). The pulp of the fruit is mainly 

 used with the Cassias, especially the commonest, C. Fistula?* the 

 Purging Cassia, or Pudding-pipe Tree, known in France under the 



1 See above, p. 92, figs. 65, 66; Bot. Mag., t. t. 54; Bot. Mag., t. 4006.— Lindl. & Paxt., 

 4453. — The flowers are offered to the gods in the Mag., i. t. 28. 



Buddhist temples. 9 See above, page 69, figs. 38, 39. 



2 See Lindl. & Paxt., Fl. Gard., t. 59.— Bot. I0 J'eg. Kingd., 519 ; Fl. Med., 258. 



Beg. (1841), t. 30.— Bot. Mag., t. 3964, 4839. " Collad., Monograph, des Casses, 4to 



3 See Adansonia, vi. 185, t. iii. fig. 10. (1816.) 



4 8. Speciosa Jacq., vulgarly named Belle l - Cassia Fistula alexandrina R\rn., Pin., 

 Theodore and highly prized by the colonists at 403. — T, Li.stif., 619, t. 392 E — C. nigra 

 the Cape, is the most remarkable of all the species Dod., Pempt., 787.— C. Fistula L., Spec, 540. 

 for its handsome red flowers. — (See Hook., Exot. — Gj;etn., Fruct., ii., t. 147, fig. 1. — DC, 

 FL, t. 159; Bot. Mag., t. 1153.) Prod,:, ii. 490, n. 10.— Gnu., Drog. Sitr.pl., 



5 See Bot. Mag., t. 2S84. ed. 4, iii. 345, fig. 315. RosBNTH., op. tit., 



6 Boj., in But. Mag., t. 3325, 3326. 1035. — Bactyrilobiu Fistula W., Emm. Rort. 



7 Sw., Obs., 166. — Poidciaua jmlcherrimal,., BcroL, 439 — Cathartocarpus Fisfrla Veks., 

 Spec, 554; DC, Prodr., ii. 4S4, n. 1. Syn., i. 459.— Lixdl., Fl. Med., 262. 



8 Poi/iciana Gilliesii Hook., Bot. Misc., i. 



