CONTEMPORARY WRITINGS. 
333 
fanical mission to New Granada, now in charge 
of the Botanic Garden, Trinidad) from Edin- 
burgh and Glasgow. His attention was first 
directed to them at the fruiterers' shops in 
Edinburgh, where he learned that they were 
already rather extensively imported from Para 
to Glasgow, and much used at tabic with the 
dessert. In size and shape the seeds are not 
unlike the so-called Brazil-nuts (seeds of 
Beriholletia excclsa) ; they are equally co- 
vered by a hard coat, but are more irregular, 
and are longitudinally furrowed. This led to 
a comparison with the fruits of allied plants in 
the Museum ; and it was easy to see that the 
seeds belonged to a species of Lecythis ; and 
all doubts were removed on referring to Aublct, 
and finding the identical species described as 
Lecythis Zabucajo. It is there remarked 
that the seeds are much, eaten by the colonists 
in French Guiana, being sweet and delicate, 
and considered preferable to the almonds of 
Europe ; an opinion in which we are quite 
disposed to agree. On account of the excel- 
lency of the seeds, the French government, 
much to their credit, introduced the cultivation 
of this tree into the Mauritius nearly a century 
ago, and in 1761, Aublet tells us the plants 
were then in a flourishing condition. Happy 
would it be for our colonies, and for the British 
West Indian islands in particular, if the in- 
troduction and cultivation of useful plants, 
suited to the respective climates, were, in like 
manner, encouraged by the British govern- 
ment ! The entire fruit in question is, like 
all the Lecythidece, highly curious : it is six 
inches and more long, and about four wide, of 
a thick and woody texture, opening at the top 
like a box, with a transverse lid, from the 
upper side of which lid a woody column de- 
scends to the bottom of the inside of the fruit, 
and around this column the large seeds are 
arranged. This and other species of the 
genus are called in French Guiana Afarmite 
(porringer) de singe; partly because the 
monkeys have the good taste to show a fond- 
ness for the kernels, and partly from the use 
made by the negroes of the emptied capsules 
(the lid being removed), wherewith to entrap 
these wily animals. The mouth, it will be 
observed, of the capsule is narrower than the 
inside ; this being filled with sugar, and laid 
in a place frequented by monkeys, they grasp 
the sugar, and by this means enlarge the paw 
so as to be unable to extricate it ; while their 
greediness forbids the opening of the paw and 
loss of the sugar. The heavy fruit of the 
Zabucajo prevents the escape of the animal, 
who is pursued and taken in the monkey- 
trap." — Hooker's Journal of Botany. 
The Rose of Jericho. — At the be- 
ginning of the present year (1848), Dr. 
D'Avoine, President of the Society of Me- 
dical and Natural Science of Malines, pub- 
lished a memoir of John Storms, a learned 
professor of the ancient University of Lou- 
vain, who was born at Malines in the year 
1559, and died 1650 ; and who wrote a mo- 
nography of the Anastatica hierochuntina, 
better known under the name of Rose of 
Jericho. Dr. D'Avoine was far from antici- 
pating that an illustration by Sir William 
Hooker of the Anastatica would appear in 
England a few months afterwards, giving an 
excellent figure of the fresh plant, and another 
of the dried plant, with all the details of its 
structure. In the remarks of Sir William 
Hooker on the Rose of Jericho, there is no 
mention made of the eminent labours of John 
Storms ; neither of the writings of Professor 
Kickx, who had already exhumed from ob- 
livion the monograph of 1607 (the time when 
the work of John Storms appeared) ; nor is 
there any notice taken of those of M. 
D'Avoine. Lonicera calls it Amonum rosa 
sanctce Marice ; but Linnosus, Jacquin, Alton, 
De Candolle, Sprengel, and indeed all bo- 
tanists call it, Anastatica hierochuntina, or 
Jerusalem Anastatica. Sir W. Hooker does 
not seem to recollect other synonymes ; nei- 
ther is he disposed to speak of the sacred 
quality of the plant, nor of the superstitious 
veneration which is shown for it among the 
ignorant people in the country where it grows 
spontaneously. Commelin first called it 
Rosa hierochuntina, and Dalechamp Rose of 
Jericho ; latterly these names have been 
given to two other hygrometric plants, both 
different from the true roses ; viz., to Lyco- 
podium lepidophyllum, a south Mexican 
plant, and to the capsules of a certain Me- 
sembryanthemum from South Africa. " The 
rose of Jericho,'' continues Sir W. Hooker, 
" is as much a rose as it is a cabbage. It is a 
humble and insignificant plant in appearance, 
but it has long since attracted the attention 
of travellers in the East by its hygrometrical 
properties. The old annual stem, being pre- 
served, rolls itself up in the dry weather or 
season. It then rises out of the sand in the 
hurricanes of the deserts of Syria and Egypt, 
and floats in the wind. If it rains, the 
branches revert to their natural position ; 
and again, when the weather becomes dry, it 
curls up and contracts. This property lasts 
for years : all kinds of fables have been che- 
rished about it, and it has acquired a consi- 
derable reputation among the people. This 
vegetable is, nevertheless, rarely cultivated, 
and it is only propagated from seed. It is 
thus that it is in the collection at Kew." 
In regard to the locality of the Rose of 
Jericho, M. D'Avoine has cited the passage 
of Eloy, and in our turn we cannot do better 
than quote it; it is as exact as the original :-- 
