81 



N. Ord. LEGUMINOSJS. 

 Tribe DalbergiecK. 



Genus Pterocarpus,* Linn. B. & H., Gen., i, p. 547; Baill., 

 1. c., p. 319. Species 15, inhabiting tropical Asia, Africa, 



and America. 



81. Pterocarpus Marsupium,t Roxburgh, Plants of Coromandel, 



ii,p. 9 (1798). 



Vengay (Tamil). Buja (Bengal). Bastard Teak. 

 Figures. Roxburgh, 1. c., t. 116; Beddome, PI. Sylvatica, t. 21. 



Description. -A large deciduous tree with an erect trunk 6 8 

 feet in girth and numerous spreading horizontal branches, bark 

 brownish-grey, coming off in flakes, the inner bark fibrous, red. 

 Leaves abundant, alternate, without stipules (?), unequally pinnate, 

 petioles round, slender, slightly thickened at the base ; leaflets 

 5 to 7, alternate, on short thickened stalks, oval or oblong-ovate, 

 2 4 inches long, blunt or subacute, emarginate, entire, cori- 

 aceous, smooth, dark green and shining when full grown, with 

 numerous lateral veins connected by raised reticulations. Flowers 

 rather small, in lax terminal or axillary paniculate racemes, 

 shortly stalked, the peduncles and pedicels more or less silky with 

 adpressed hairs, bracts minute deciduous, buds curved. Calyx 

 tubular- campanulate with 5 short nearly equal blunt teeth, very 

 shortly silky. Corolla papilionaceous, petals nearly equal with 

 long claws, wavy at the margins, pale yellow; standard narrow, 

 recurved, wings free, turned down, keel-petals connected in front, 

 curved upwards. Stamens 10, filaments monadelphous, forming a 

 tube for about half their length, sometimes split into 2 bundles 

 of 5 stamens, anthers small. Pistil small, stipitate, hairy, style 

 pointed. Pod indehiscent, stalked, greatly compressed, orbicular, 

 1 14 inch wide, falcate the style having become lateral, hard, 

 leathery, finely silky, with a broad, crisped, veined, parchment- 



* Name from irnpov, a wing, and KapTrog, fruit, from the winged legumes. 

 f Mar sup ium, a pouch, from the shape of the fruit. 



