378 NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 
Ornithopus, Desmodium, Centrosema, Canavalia, Rynchosia, Milletia, 
Deguelia, Virgilia, &.; and why Galega officinalis (Rue des chévres, 
Goat’s-rue’) has so long been used as a sudorific, vermifuge, and 
alexipharmic. 
Many Papilionacee afford saccharine, gummy, and fatty matters ; 
without mentioning the sugar developed under certain conditions in 
the seeds of several Viciee and Phaseolee which makes them so 
agreeable as food, we may call attention to the sweet taste of the 
various Liquorice-roots (racines de Réglisse?) used in medicine, and 
especially those of Glycyrrhiza glabra (fig. 165), echinata, and glan- 
dulifera, and of the Lianes a Reglisse (Liquorice-vines) which are 
species of Abrus,‘ of Trifolium alpinum, Astragalus glycyphyllus, &ce. A 
kind of manna is secreted by the species of A/hagi, and notably by 
the Camel’s Thorn (4. Maurorum), at least in certain countries.’ 
The Arabs call this manna Zerem-jabim, and obtain it by merely 
shaking the branches; it is used for the food of man and still more 
of cattle, of which it is in certain cantons the only fodder during one 
season in the year. The gum exuded from certain Papilionacee is 
gum-tragacanth; it issues in plates, twisted sheets, or worm-like 
masses from clefts in the stems of several eastern Astragals, especially 
Astragalus verus’ (fig. 161), long supposed to be the only kind, and 
A. gummifer Lasiuu., creticus LamK., aristatus W., and stroboliferus 
Linpt.’ It is the seed that usually contains oil in Papilionacee. Those 
of Phaseolee, Viciee, Galegee, and Hedysaree contain it in variable pro- 
portions. But those more used are the Harth-nuts or Ground-nuts 
(Pistaches de terre), the seeds of Arachis hypogea,*’ which ripen under- 
ground, like those of the Munduli (Voandzeia subterranea’); both 
these plants are cultivated on this account in most hot countries. 
Many members of this order furnish colouring matters. First 
5 Persia and Bokhara. It is said that the 
secretion does not take place in Egypt and India, 
1L,, Spec., 1063.—DC., Prodr., ii. 248.—G. 
vulgaris BLACKW. 
2 GuiB., op. cit., ed. 6, ili, 325. The true 
officinal Liquorice is Glycyrrhiza glabra L. 
(Spec., 1046;—G. laevis Pat. ;—Liquiritia 
officinalis Mazncx). Russian Liquorice is G. 
echinata L. (Spec, 1046;—DC., Prodr., ii. 
248, n. 5). 
3 Waxpst. & Kirt., Pl. Hung., i. 20, t. 21.— 
DC., Prodr., loc. cit., u. 2.— G@. hirsuta Pauu. 
4 See p. 375, note 3.—H. By., in Dict. 
Encyel. des Se. Méd., i. 206. 
6 Oxiv., Poy., iii. t. 44.—DC., Prodr., ii. 296, 
n. 144. 
7 See H. Bn., in Dict. Encycl. des Sc. Méd., 
vii. 1. 
8 L., Spec. 1040.—DC., Prodr., ii. 474. (See 
p. 215, figs. 184, 185).—Gu1B., op. cit., iii. 383.— 
Rosrnru., Syn. Pl. Diaph., 1011.—H. By., in 
Dict, Encycl. des Se. Méd., v. 773. 
° Dup.-Tu., Nov. Gen. Madag., 23. 
(See 
above, p. 235, note 6.) 
