Acadeu] Legwninosce. 123 



A shrub or small tree, with dark bark and slender terete 

 straight branchlets, young parts pubescent ; 1. small, rachis 

 2— 2.\ in., pubescent, stipular spines variable from small and 

 inconspicuous to 2 in., slender, spreading white, sometimes 

 quite absent, pinnae 3-5 pair, i-i^ in., distant, lflts. 24-30, 

 (12-15 pair), \ in., very shortly stalked, strap-shaped; fl. in 

 dense globular heads, 2-5 together from the axils, peduncles 

 \-\ in., pubescent with 2 bractlets above the middle ; cor. 

 twice as long as cal. ; pod 4-6 in., straight, 8-12-seeded, 

 strongly constricted at sutures between the seeds, densely 

 covered with fine grey down. 



Dry region ; very rare. Collected at Trincomalie by Glenie, but 

 perhaps only introduced there ; Jaffna, apparently wild, but probably 

 -originally planted. 



Native in N.W. India, Arabia, Egypt, Tropical Africa. This is the 

 well-known 'Babul' so common in N. India; but Beddome has never 

 seen it truly wild in the forests of the Peninsula, and it is unlikely to be 

 native to Ceylon. 



On the upper part of the branches bearing the flower-heads the leaves 

 are often suppressed. 



2. A. planifrons, W. and A. Prod. 276 (1834). Odai, Udai, T. 



[Plate XXXV.] 



Trimen in Journ. Bot. xxiii. 144. 

 FL B. Ind. ii. 293. 



A small tree, usually with an erect stem and an umbrella- 

 like head, branches spreading in a plane (like those of Cedar), 

 bark very thick, dark grey, rather smooth, on the young 

 branchlets purplish, stipular spines of two kinds mixed, either 

 very short and curved downwards, or 1J-2 in. long, straight, 

 very divaricate, slender, scarcely tapering, white with a brown 

 polished point ; 1. very small, in fascicles from arrested 

 branchlets, rachis about 1 in., very slender, flattened above, 

 slightly hairy, pinnae 3 or 4 pair, closely placed near end of 

 rachis, \— § in. long, lflts. very minute, 10-20 (5-10 pair) strap- 

 shaped, obtuse ; fl. minute, sessile in dense globular heads 

 I in. diam., peduncles \-\ in., very slender, with the bracts 

 below the middle, coming off with the 1. from the arrested 

 branchlets ; pod about 2 in. by \ in. wide, cylindrical, turgid, 

 acute, curved nearly into a ring, glabrous. 



Dry region; very rare. Confined to the island of Mannar (and a 

 very small part of the mainland opposite), where it is extremely abundant. 

 Fl. Oct-March ; pale creamy-white. 



Also in S. India and in Ramisseram Island. 



This is the 'Umbrella Tree' of the English ;* and very characteristic 



* The Rev. J. Cordiner, who visited Mannar in 1804, gives an account 

 of the ' Umbrella Tree ' in his ' Ceylon,' vol. ii. pp. 8 and 32. 



