80 PHYSOSTIGMA YENENOSUM 



the keel and becoming thickened and stiff in its twisted beak, 

 where it forms a ring densely bearded on the inner side of its 

 distal half with crisp hairs, and provided at the extremity with a 

 triangular, solid, fleshy, reflexed, beaked appendage. Pod shortly 

 stalked, 4 to 7 inches long, compressed, pointed at the end, 

 2-valved, valves rather thin, horny, pale brown, with a network of 

 transverse veins, thickly lined within with a white loose woolly 

 tissue. Seeds 2 or 3 in the pod, oblong tending to reniform in 

 outline, 1^ inch long by f inch wide, flattened on the back, rounded 

 on the front, sides, and ends, hilum very long, linear, extending 

 from the micropyle at one end entirely along the rounded side of 

 the seed to the opposite extremity, with a raised border, and marked 

 down the centre by a thread-like line (raphe) ; testa nearly smooth, 

 dark chocolate-brown, paler on the borders of the hilum which is 

 black, lined with a yellowish skin; cotyledons when dry semilunar on 

 section, leaving a hollow space between them, with a shallow 

 groove running down the side next the hilum ; radicle short, 

 terete. 



Habitat. A native of an apparently restricted portion of west 

 tropical Africa, near the mouth of the Niger and Old Calabar, in 

 the Gulf of Guinea; it seems to be somewhat rare even there, 

 and is said to be destroyed everywhere by order of the government 

 except where it is preserved for the use of justice, as an ordeal. 

 The plant has been introduced, however, into Brazil and India. 

 The seeds readily germinate ; but in this country we believe that 

 the plants have not as yet produced flowers. In appearance and 

 structure Physostigma is very close to Pliaseolus, in which genus is 

 included the Scarlet Kunner and Haricot Bean ; indeed the 

 remarkably large hilum of the seed and the stigmatic appendage 

 are the only distinguishing characters. The late D. Hanbury 

 first pointed out that this appendage is not hollow, but solid. 

 We are indebted to Prof. Balfour for the loan of the original 

 specimens from which he described the plant, as well as for a 

 carefully coloured plate, of which the artist has availed himself. 



Balfour, 1. c., p. 310; D. Hanbury, in Journ. Botany, 1863, 

 p. 239 ; Flora Trop. Africa, ii, p. 191. 



