2 
(male and female in the same raceme) from the forks of the 
younger branches, the male (more numerous) above, the female 
below, and expanding dl days before the male. The fruit is 
a pendulous capsule, about an inch in diameter, nearly globular, 
dry and hard, when ripe, containing three smooth and polished 
seeds, greyish yellow | or browni m düssdtdty mottled and 
rotae die with purplish black. The testa (or coat of the seed) is 
y hard and thick; the cotyledons are very thin, foliaceous, 
slightly cordate at the ‘base ; the endosperm oily but solid. 
In the young e Manihot eo P somewhat resembles the 
well-known Cass r Mandioeca plant (Manihot utilissima, 
Pohl.) and Nie 3 sinillar awalan mg The tree, when full 
grown, has a stem resembling a birch, “ and the outer bark comes 
In 1876 Mr. Cross, who had been engaged on behalf of the 
xovernment of India to collect seeds and plants of india-rubber 
trees in South America, visited the Ceara region on the north east 
of Brazil, midway between the towns of Para and Bahia. This is 
outside the great forest region of the Amazon valley, and is 
own as the Sertao or wilderness, extending in a great belt from 
the Paranahyba river "to the Sào Francisco. 
Mr. Cross, in his Report to the India Office in 1877 (p. 14) 
describes the flat country from Ceara, running back to the 
mountains, on which the tree abounds, as manifestly p 
“a very dry arid climate for a considerable part of the yea 
This is SEEN from the fact that the mandiocca and other des 
require to be irrigated. The rainy season is said to begin in 
November and end in May or June. "Torrents of rain are then 
reported o fall for several days in succession, after which the 
weather moderates for a brief space. According to some state- 
ments there are oóntibn al years in which hardly any rain falls. 
This assertion concurs with e fot i boa by the imi 
in general. The daily tempe board the ship ran 
from 82° to 85? F., but iib Wu is koe probably 90°. The 
localities drawal "by me nowhere seemed to be elevated more 
than 900 feet above the sea.” At Pacatuba, about 40 miles from 
Ceara, the actual place where the specimens were obtained, * the 
general forest was tolerably high, but the sparse, small, foliage did 
not afford much shade from the fierce rays of the sun. The soil 
was in places a sort of soft sandstone or gravel which was bound 
up in = most extraordinary manner. Neither grass nor weeds 
Pride ong this phe and there si an pru praep of 
rns, mo ev , and oth ants.” In another plac what 
farther from the co vong yrs traveller, ilio y after enter tei the 
bush-like forest, *came on a large tract of land co vered by 
immense masses of grey nae some of which might be fifty 
tons or more in weight. Rounded masses of the same rock also 
cropped out in many places. . Man — et rubber 
trees were growing in the spaces between thins granite masses. 
The situation was very dry, but no doubt red seedlings 
had sprung up, which, owing to numerous thickets of shrubs, 
were not perceived.” 
Cross obtained at Maracanahu, 30 miles inland from the town 
of Ceara, lat, 4° S., 60 plants and 700 seeds. (Report, pp. 12-14.) 
