94 JOURNAL. BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol. X. 



regarding the identity of Anaeardium occidentale, var. Americanum^ of 

 the Western tropics with Anaeardium occidentale, var. Indicum, of the 

 Eastern tropics. " The most erroneous assertions," says Alphonse 

 DeCandolle, " about the origin of this species were formerly made, and 

 in spite of what I said on the subject in 1855, * find them occasion- 

 ally reproduced." In proof of this he mentions Tussac, who says f 

 that Anaeardium occidentale " is an East Indian species," thus aggra- 

 vating Linnseus' mistake, who believed it to be Asiatic and American. 

 Divorced, as I am in India, from the full literature on this subject, 

 especially continental, including the Journal referred to by A. 

 DeCandolle, in the foot-note quoted below, and marked 1 at page 199 

 of his " Origin of Cultivated Plants," I am unable to examine the 

 arguments he has used to show that there is no such thing as two 

 distinct varieties, viz., an American and an Indian, of the species 

 Anaeardium occidentale, as described by his illustrious father Pyrame 

 DeCandolle in his voluminous " Prodromus." I am in a position, 

 however, to unhesitatingly accept the conclusions of Alphonse DeCan- 

 dolle, the son, in preference to those of Pyrame DeCandolle, the father, 

 as the former are the result of a wider acquaintance with geographical 

 distribution of the Cashew-nut plant. 



But before I proceed to quote here fully the grounds on which 

 I accept Alphonse DeCandolle's conclusions, I may note one point 

 with reference to his remark {vide p. 199 op. cit.) which runs thus : — 

 " The French name Pommier d^acajon (Mahogany apple tree) is as 

 absurd as it is possible to be. It is a tree belonging to the order 

 Terehintacece or Anacardiacece^^ very different from the Rosacece and 

 MeliacecB to which the apple and the mahogany belong ; the edible 

 part is more like a pear than an apple, and, botanically speaking, 

 is not a fruit but a receptacle or support of the fruit which 

 resembles a large bean.'" The italics are mine. The true fruit neither 

 resembles a " bean," nor can it be called a " large bean." From my 

 foregoing remarks, it will have been apparent that I am not disposed 

 to term the fleshy development of the peduncle, called in popular 

 parlance the ifa;i/?W^, " a fruit like an apple." Nor would I, with 



* Geog. Bot. Rais, p. 87a from the foot-note of A. DeCandolle in hie Origin of 

 Cultivated Plants. — K. K. K. 



t Flor. dtis Antiilc.-, ill, p. 65, 



