TEE POISONOUS PLANTS OF BOMBAY, 269 



I may observe, in concluding this notice of Alangium Lamarchii, that 

 Baillou classes the Alangium series under the natural order '' Comhre- 

 tacemr The reader is referred to Baillon's Natural History of Plants 

 itself for his reasons for setting forth such an arrangement. I prefer 

 to accept the classification of the plant under the " CornaceoiP 



The plant described as Fseiidalangium by the venerable Baron Sir 

 Ferdinand Von Mueller under what he terms N. 0. Alanglacece,* 

 appears to be quite a different plant from the one I am describing 

 here. It needs but a passing notice to show that our Alangium 

 Lamarckii is not to be found in Australia — not certainly in the colony 

 of Victoria, of which the venerable Baron has been the sole botanical 

 guide for nearly half a century. 



The plant prevails on the Coromandel Coast f as will be seen from 

 the description given of it by Roxburgh. 



Turning now to th^ consideration of the remarks of LeMaout and 

 DeOaisne,! I may observe that their observation to the following 

 effect is literally correct, namely, that the woody stem is sometimes 

 subterranean, emitting herbaceous branches. My foregone remarks 

 regarding the main tree now standing in the Military Hospital Com- 

 pound in Thana and many others undescribed by me but existing in 

 the close vicinity of my Military Hospital amply bear me out in my 

 own description of the " suckers," as also in the quotation I now cite 

 from LeMaout and DeCaisne. These joint authors rightly remark 

 that " the leaves of the Cornece are caducous or persistent." They 

 are caducous in the sense that they fall when it is time for the flowers 

 and new foliage to appear. The branches at this time are bare ; the 

 leaves fall just before the blossom appears. When the blossom appears 

 there is not a single old leaf on the tree. This is what I have already 

 stated, and I may repeat here to emphasize the chief characteristic of 

 the plant at the time of its renewed foliage. This renewed foliage is 

 the striking characteristic of the plant as the fruit is maturing. 



In a small iiroc/mre published at Mangalore in 1891, by the Basel 

 Mission Book and Tract Depository, entitled " Five Hundred Indian 

 Plants ; their use in Medicine and Arts,'^ at page Q^^ Alangium 



* Baron Sir Ferdinand Von Mueller's Fragmenta Phytographise Australise, vol, II, 

 Melbourne, 1860-1861, 

 t PI. Coromand,, vol. Ill, p. 79, plate 283. 

 X p. 475 of Mrs. Hooker's Translation, 



