30 
D/. MYRSINACEJE. 
sisting of a pair of horizontally spreading shining oval drupe- or 
berry-like lobes united at their base (one often abortive) of a 
dull livid greenish-olive colour with a pale watery or pellucid 
waxy appearance like a Mistletoe-berry (or dried Litclii fr. with 
the outer shell or crust removed), dark in the middle from the 
black central seeds shining through the pellucid watery or juicy 
pulp and thin smooth skin ; each lobe 5 or 6 lines long, 3 or 4 in 
diam., mostly both 2-seeded and only by abortion one of them 
1 -seeded. Seeds intense black like charcoal, large elliptic- 
oblong pointed at each end, 4 lines long, 2-3 broad, mostly 
flattened and quite plain and even (as if cut with a knife) 
towards each other, more or less convex at the back, and lying, 
. like 2 thickened scales, closely face to face. 
Though the fr. is sweetish juicy and not unpleasant to the 
taste, with a strong flavour of paregoric or laudanum, it is 
strange that, even in a place so nearly destitute of food as the 
X. Deserta (where it abounds), neither lizards, birds nor men 
appear to touch it. Yet it is not reputed to be poisonous, 
though from its botanical affinities, besides the above fact, it 
must be regarded with suspicion. 
The XI). pi. is a mere maritime form of the sp., of a stiller 
more stoutly branched habit, with excessively thick and leathery 
more rounded 1. and larger handsomer fl. than in the Mad. pi. 
Webb (Phyt. Can. iii. 166) says that the fr. is not larger 
than a pair of barley-corns ; and on this ground, with others 
less important, rejects the syn. quoted by Linn, of Ferrari ; who 
^ however describes it to be, exactly as in the XD. Mad. pi., of 
the size of small olives (delle alive piu piccole). I have gathered 
Webb’s pi. in Tenerife, Palma and Hierro; but I have no note 
about the fr., and only this remark about the fl. of the Hierran 
pi., viz. that they are “ fragrant, but not like Clover," as they 
are in Mad. Is then the Can. pi. possibly distinct from the 
latter P Lamarck compares the fragrance in his pi. to that of 
Jonquils. 
The objections against changing the name of J. azoricum L. 
apply a fortiori to the present sp. 
Order LYII. MYllSINACEyE. 
Fl. perfect regular (rarely diclinous) 4-6- or 7- mostly *5- 
merous. Cal. gamosepalous 4— 6-fid or -partite persistent. Cor. 
mostly gamopetalous 4-6-lobed or partite. ^Estivation various, 
