N. 0. leguminos^:. 483 



red streaks ; heart-wood with an irregular outline, and radiating 

 ramifications, very durable. Leaves abruptly pinnate, with 

 20-40, glabrescent, close, obtuse, opposite, oblong leaflets. Ra- 

 cemes copious, lax at the end of branchlets, with 10-15 flowers 

 together. Pedicels articulated at the base of the Calyx. Bracts 

 boatshaped, enclosing buds, caducous. Calyx-tube turbinate, 

 segments 4. Petals 3, under Jin. long, unequal, variegated with 

 red and yellow, the 2 lower reduced to scales, perfect stamens 

 3, filaments united to the middle of the anthers, oblong, versatile. 

 Ovary stipitate, the stalk adnate to Calyx-tube. Pod thick, filled 

 when mature with dark brown acid pulp transversed by fibres. 

 3-8in. long, lin. or more broad, 3-10-seeded. Seeds brown, 

 shining, without albumen, the outer coat producing abund- 

 ant mucilage, when steeped in water for a time. 



Most authors make two species of Tamarindus, the Indian 

 kind, with long pods, and the West Indian, with short pods; 

 bat even those who adopt this view of the subject generally 

 raise a question of their specific identity. India is probably 

 the aboriginal country of both, whence the species was intro- 

 duced into West Indies. Even in the East the Tamarinds of the 

 Archipelago are considered the best of those of India. The Arabs 

 called the tree Tamr-i-hindee, or Indian Date, from which has 

 been derived the generic name, Tamarindus. The inhabitants 

 of the East have a notion that it is dangerous to sleep under 

 the tree, and it has been remarked, as of our Beech in Europe, 

 that the ground beneath is always bare, and that no plant 

 seems to thrive under its branches.* 



In the East, the pulpy fruits of the Tamarind are preserved 

 without sugar, being merely dried in the sun and cured in salt. 

 In the West Indies, the pulp is usually packed in small 

 kegs between layers of sugar, and hot syrup is poured on 

 the whole. In order to enable them to keep without ferment- 

 ation for a length of time, the first syrup, which is very acid, 



^Apropos of this remark it may here be observed that the Bhangi or 

 sweeper of the Santa Cruz Station, B. B. and C. I. Railway, has his sleeping- 

 hut under a group of 5 or 6 tamarind trees, huge and shady, where for the 

 last 20 years the hut has been in use (K, R, Kirtikar). 



