250 Mr Barber , Parasitic Trees in Southern India. 
So much for the Santalaceae. Root-parasitism may now be 
extended to a series of tropical shrubs and climbers among the 
Olacaceae, in general appearance even less suggestive of this 
peculiar habit than the sandal. A preliminary study has revealed 
the fact that at least four genera are thus provided with the 
capacity of obtaining their mineral salts and water from the roots 
of other plants. The first observation of root-parasitism among 
the Olacaceae was not, however, made in India, but by Heckel in 
some seedlings of Ximenia americana raised in the botanical 
garden of Marseilles. The work in South India was quite inde- 
pendent of this. My botanical assistant in Madras, having been 
sent out to collect sandal haustoria, in his digging came across 
some so different in appearance that he traced them to their 
parent which proved to be Cansjera Rheedii. Again, independently 
of this, the author found haustoria on the roots of Olax scandens. 
This has led to a study of the Olacaceae in Madras whenever 
opportunity occurred, and collections have already been made of 
haustoria in the roots of Cansjera Rheedii, Olax scandens, Ximenia 
americana and Opilia amentacea. Further examination will un- 
doubtedly increase the number of genera and species, at any rate 
among the Olaceae and Opilieae. 
I may remark, in passing, on the laborious and even dangerous 
nature of this collecting work. The ground has usually to be 
broken up by crowbars unless carefully watered for days before — 
a matter of great difficulty in these dry regions — and it is ex- 
tremely difficult to get the haustoria out uninjured, while the 
tracing of the roots attached to their proper species, which is 
essential, is very laborious. In one case a root of sandal was 
followed for two days at a depth of from one to three feet, extend- 
ing to a distance of 105 feet in an almost straight line. No 
living endings were found in this space, a fact which indicates to 
what a distance these parasitic plants can travel underground in 
search of the roots of their hosts. 
The country in which Ximenia and Opilia are found is, further- 
more, very feverish. The two officers deputed to examine these 
plants in September last have been constantly ill since that time 
to the present date, while the servant who accompanied them died 
of the effects of the journey. 
The Natural Order Olacaceae has been fittingly regarded as a 
refuge for the destitute, a sort of botanical rubbish heap on which 
various plants with a certain superficial resemblance might be 
dumped. The four sections of the order have little in common 
when closely examined. To give an idea of the uncertainty 
regarding different genera, let us take Cansjera which, according 
to van Tieghem*, has been treated as follows: — 
* Van Tieghem, “ Recherches sur la structure et les affinites des Thymeleacees 
et des Peneacees,” Ann. d. Sc. Nat. Ser. vn. T. xvn. 1893. 
