379 



lar as to its soil. I have seen however excellent Lemons grown in 

 Singapore by Mr. Gunn. 



Citron, Citrus medica. — The citron has been cultivated here, and 

 some forms are well known to natives. The Katinga of Southern 

 Siam, described in Bulletin 3 p. 96, is probably a wild form, and 

 there are some curious thick skinned wild oranges in the Peninsula 

 which are also probably wild forms. The fruit of the citron proper 

 is of large size oblong and irregularly warted or wrinkled, the rind 

 very thick and the pulp scanty and dry. The rind is the part used 

 in confectionery, as candied peel. The Katinga had lanceolate 

 thin leaves with a very short petiole. The fruit was about 4 inches 

 long and 3 inches through oblong and rounded at both ends green- 

 ish coloured eventually turning yellow, dotted and warty. The 

 rind is half an inch thick lemon yellow inside full of oblong parallel 

 turpentine cells narrowed at the mouth and enlarged below, tough 

 and with a turpentiney taste rather bitter. 



There are five partitions in the fruit rather thick and tough. The 

 seeds numerous about 5 in a section ovate flattened \ an inch 

 long i inch thick olive grey. The pulp is a sticky tasteless mass 

 of flattened fibres olive green. 



This is perhaps the original wild form of the citron, which 

 Loureiro gives the name of Cay tanh yen as Cochin Chinese which 

 might easily be modified into Katinga. 



Citrus hystrix, — Limau Puru, is a small tree with dark green 

 leaves 3 inches long the blade 1 \ inch long and an inch wide rounded 

 and very slightly notched round the edge, the petiole wing is nearly 

 as large or even larger than the blade so that the leaf looks as if it 

 was made of two one on the end of the other. The fruit is about 

 2 inches long green pearshaped and curiously wrinkled all over. 

 The rind is about £ inch thick. The pulp is slightly bitter and very 

 acid. It is chiefly used for cleaning the hair but also in medicine. 

 The rind is scraped to use in flavouring cakes. 



This plant is probably a cultivated form of the citron. I obtained 

 a plant with very similar fruit in Pahang some years ago under the 

 name of Limau Kedangsa the only difference being the wing of the 

 petiole of the leaf which was quite narrow the development of this 

 wing however is not at all characteristic as trees diffe r very much 

 in this matter. The fruit is figured in Bonavia's orai ges and Le- 

 mons of India and Ceylon Plate CCXXV under the name of the 

 Leech Lime or Caffre lime. He considers it to be the Citrus 

 hystrix of Kurz, and probably originally wild in the Moluccas. 



The Orange, Citrus Aurantium, is often cultivated especially in 

 Malacca. In Singapore the soil is hardly sufficiently good, and the 

 trees are often unhealthy, producing small and sour fruits and 

 being much affected by blight. It is probable that the excessive 

 wet of our climate is injurious to the orange trees, as in the dryer 

 portions of the Peninsula such as Malacca they are much better. 

 I have seen very good oranges there, as well as Tangerine oranges. 

 It is perhaps unnecessary to mention that our oranges like all tro- 

 pical ones are quite green when ripe and do not develop the yel- 

 low colour or the imported Chinese or European oranges. Some 



