No. 11.— 1858-9.] SCRIPTURE BOTANY OF CEYLOX. 319 



Olive oil and Olives are extensive articles of commerce. 



The fragrant olive of China with which the Chinese are 

 said to flavor their tea, was introduced to Ceylon many years 

 ago, and we have two other species of 01i\e indigenous to the 

 Island, but neither of them must be confounded with the 

 ®z)d<d veralu or illupie trees, which belong to two distinct 

 Natural Orders, and both considerably separated from the Olive. 



I suggest this precaution, from the fact that some 

 of my friends of the American Mission at Jaffna are in 

 the habit of alluding to the illupei, which is one of the most 

 valuable trees of the Northern Peninsula, as the Ceylon 

 Olive tree, and because in this quarter Europeans are in the 

 habit of calling the veralu the Olive. The fruits of this 

 latter tree do indeed bear such an outward resemblance to 

 the Olive, that the genus to which it belongs, has in con- 

 sequence of this resemblance, been called Elceocarpus. The 

 nuts of an allied species are those known to you all as the 

 "Brahmin beads," which, mounted as bracelets, are very com- 

 monly worn by ladies. 



Mustard. 



" The Kingdom of Heaven is like a grain of mustard seed, 

 which a man took, and sowed in a field : which indeed is 

 the least of all seeds ; but when it is grown, it is the greatest 

 among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the 

 air come and lodge in the branches thereof." (Matt. xiii. 

 31, 32.) 



Perhaps the plant here translated Mustard, has called forth 

 as much research and learned disquisition as any one named 

 in the Bible. Some writers attempt to prove that because a 

 species of the plant which produces Mustard (Sin apis) grows 

 in Palestine to a considerable size, no other plant could have 

 been meant : but the late Dr. Royle produced incontrovertible 

 evidence to prove that the tree here meant is the Salvadora 

 Persica of Botanist?, a small tree, native of the hot dry parts 



