GUM AIiDlONIACUM. 387 



ammoniac grows, as in the plains east of El Araiche,' where 

 he has seen at least twenty of these birds in the air at once, 

 darting down on the insects with astonishing rapidity (p. 118). 

 Jackson's figure (t. 8) of the so-called beetle apparently repre- 

 sents a dipterous insect resembliug a Bombylius, with a very 

 long straight proboscis. 



Lindley (' Flora Medica,' 46) doubtfully refers Jackson's 

 Fashook to the eastern Ferula orientalis L. ; and Fliickiger and 

 Hanbury (' Pharmacographie,' 289) say that, according to 

 Lindley, the Ferula tingitana yields a milky gum resin, having 

 some resemblance to Ammoniacum, which is an object of traffic 

 with Egypt and Arabia, where it is employed like the ancient 

 drug in fumigations. The authors go on to say that there can 

 be but little doubt that the Maroccan Ammoniacum is identical 

 with that of the ancients, and that it may well have been 

 imported by way of Cyrene from regions lying farther west- 

 ward. 



Pliny and Dioscorides say that the Ammoniacum is the juice 

 of a Narthex growing about Cyrene and Lybia, and that it is 

 produced in the neighbourhood of the temple of Ammon. 



Dr. Leared (' Morocco and the Moors,' 356) was informed 

 that the Fashook grows at a place two days' journey from 

 Mogador, on the road to the city of Marocco,^ but states that 

 the exudation from the roots of specimens which he obtained 

 differed from the African Ammoniacum. We, on the other 

 hand, were persistently assured that it grew nowhere along 

 that route, nor nearer to it than El Araiche, north of Marocco 

 city. A-nd this is confirmed by information obtained by Mr. 

 E,. Drummond Hay to the effect that it is found near Marocco, 

 and chiefly around Tedla. The Moors who gave us this in- 

 formation at once recognised the figure by Jackson, and called 

 the plant Kilch (Keith according to Leared). The roots 

 presented to Kew by the kindness of Dr. Leared did not make 

 any indications of growth. 



' Not El Araisch, SSW. of Tangier on the Atlantic coast, bnt some 

 place in the interior, and N. of the city of Marocco. 



2 This is no doubt Blceoselirmm hvmile (Ball), which we found near 

 or at the above defined locality. Ball formed a very decided opinion 

 that Jackson's plant, whether the true Ammoniacum or not, was a 

 species of EltBOseUnum. 



c c 2 



