17-i NAT0R4L HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



which we have projiosed calling 31. J/dcis or mitis, although it has 

 received a great many other names. The latter is especially culti- 

 vated in America, where it is grown generally, like the former, from 

 cuttings. They develop fleshy roots (?) underground, more or less 

 fusiform, sometimes very large, whose form recalls that of our 

 Dahlias. Those of 31. doua\ it is said, only contain fccula, and 

 may be eaten cooked in water or under embers ; animals may 

 eat them raw without danger. But in 31. amer there is also a 

 very deleterious and very volatile juice, which may be got rid of 

 by heat or the action of water. The roots are rasped and fm-nish 

 a pulp which is enclosed in a long bag, woven with the leaves or 

 fibres of the Palm, having a weight suspended at the end whose 

 traction squeezes out the dangerous juice mixed with the pulp ; after 

 Avhich this bag, placed near the fire, soon contains only a dry 

 powder or manioc flour. Now, an ordinary press is used to extract 

 the juice. Tapioca is this same substance prepared in hard or 

 slightly elastic lumps, formed of very small spherical grains, and 

 changing into a viscid and transparent starch under the influence of 

 boiling water. In cassava, it is spread out in thin cakes, dried on a 

 heated iron plate. This fecula is used by the Galibis to prepare several 

 fermented di'inks. Perhaps alcohol -might be extracted from it for 

 economic use. Commerce also finds among the Euphorhiaceoi two 

 products of considerable importance ; a vegetable was, fm-nishcd by 

 the Tallow tree, ^ filling all the exterior coat of the seed; and 

 an oil, called wood oil, extracted in China from the inner parts of the 

 seeds of Aleuritcs cordata" (fig. 170,171) used for burning, for 

 making very useful varnishes, to coat wood to protect it from the 

 action of damp, for rendering stuffs waterproof, and for a multitude 

 of domestic purposes. The wood of the Euphorhiaccii: is generally but 

 slightly enduring. Still Securinega durissima ^ bears in the Mascarene 

 islands the name of hard wood and hatchet wood. Exccecaria 

 lanccolata.,^ from Brazil, is a good building wood ; in Australia, that 



Lcefltngii Geah. — M. Grnhami Hook. Icon. Venticin Cork, in Ann. Miis. viii. 69, t. 32. — 



t. 530. — M. pusilla PoHL. — Jafrnp/ia diilcis Jiltcococca Veniicia Sphesg. — jB. corda'a Bl. — 



Gmel. Oiiomat. v. 7. — H. Bn. in Dicf. Eiict/cl. E. rerrucosa A. Juss. — Vfrnicia motitana Lour. 



Sc. Med. he. cit. 562. — J. milis Eotth. Siiiin. — Atcuritts Vcriiicia Hassk. — Abrasin K,r.MPF. 



Seser. 21.—/. Palmata Vellos. Fl. Fhini. x. t. A»mn. E.iot. 789. {Oil or Varnish tree, TFii- 



81. {Aipi, Juca dtilcc.) lung of the Japanese). 



' Krcceetrria eebifera M. Arg. (see p. 167, -^ Emel. S>ist. ii 4008. — S. nilida W. Spec. iv. 



note 2). 761. — A. Ju.ss. Euphoiliitct. 2, fig. 4. — H. Bn. 



2 M. Arg. Prodr. 724, n. 2. — Dryniidra Euphorbiac. t. 26, fig. 33-38. 

 cordata Thcnb. Fl. Jap. 267, t. 27. — D. * Actinostemon laneenlatum Saldanh. in Adan- 



