Bustic 



775 



gravity is about i.oi. It is valued for marine construction on account of its im- 

 munity from the attacks of the Teredo; also used in ship and boat building. 



The genus contains about 75 species of trees or shrubs of tropical regions. 

 The South African S. inerme Lirmaeus, is the type. The fruit of an African 

 species, Sideroxylum dulcificum A. de CandoUe, the Miraculous berry, is edible. 

 An inferior Gutta percha is obtained from Sideroxylum attenuatum A. de CandoUe 

 of the PhiUppine islands. The name is Greek, in reference to the very hard wood 

 of these trees. 



III. BUSTIC 



GENUS DIPHOLIS A. de CANDOLLE 

 Species Dipholis salicifolia (Linnaeus) A. de CandoUe 

 Achras salicifolia lannaeus 



?N evergreen tree of the hammocks of peninsular Florida and the Keys, 

 also occurring on the Bahamas and most of the other West Indies 

 and in tropical Mexico. Its maximum height is about 16 meters, 

 with a trunk diameter of 5 dm. It is also called Cassada. 

 The trunk is straight, its branches slender and ascending, forming a round- 

 headed tree when growing in the open. The bark is about 8 mm. thick, broken 

 into thick, scaly plates of a reddish 

 gray color. The slender twigs are 

 rusty hairy, soon becoming quite 

 smooth, gray or light reddish brown, 

 and bear many small raised leaf 

 scars. The leaves are persistent, al- 

 ternate, thin, leathery, oblong to 

 eUiptic or elliptic-oblanceolate, 6 to 

 12 cm. long, usually sharp-pointed, 

 gradually tapering at the base to a 

 long, slender stalk; they have some 

 shining, brownish hairs when un- 

 folding, soon becoming smooth, dark 

 green and shining above, dull green 

 and usually smooth beneath. The 

 small flowers appear from February 

 to May, in many dense axillary or 

 lateral clusters on stout, club-shaped stalks 2 to 3 mm. long; the calyx is bell- 

 shaped, reddish silky-hairy, the 5 sepals ovate or oblong, 1.5 mm. long and blunt; 

 corolla about 4 mm. across, its spreading lobes oblong or oval and rounded, equal- 

 ing the tube in length, its appendages half the length of the lobes; staminodes 

 broad and irregularly toothed, shorter than the 5 stamens, which are inserted 

 near the base of the corolla and longer than its tube, their filaments slender; 



Fig. 706. — Bustic. 



