LEGUMINOSiE. 
259 
flowers whitish with a purple tinge, shortly pedicelled, with a 
pair of ohlong scariose deciduous bracteas about the middle of 
each pedicel. Calyx coloured, very minutely puberulous ; the 
2 upper teeth coadunate ; the 3 lower bluntish. Standard 
rounded, emarginate, with a greenish tinge in the centre: wings 
and keel coloured at the apex. Stamens 9 and 1. Ovary lin- 
ear, compressed: stigma obtuse. Stipe of the legume twice or 
thrice longer than the calyx ; wings 4, longitudinal, membrana- 
ceous, with the margin undulated and irregularly lacerated. 
1 he Dogwood tree is most common in the plains and on the 
lower hills of the limestone formation. The leaves are shed 
early in the year ; and previous to the full development of the 
new foliage, the flowers make their appearance. The wood is 
much esteemed, being heavy, firm, and very lasting, not infe- 
rior in point of durability to the English oak. The bark is em- 
ployed, like the Surinam poison, to intoxicate fish. For this 
purpose it is thrown, coarsely pounded, into the deep still part 
of some stream, when the water soon acquires a reddish 
shade, and in a few minutes the fish begin to rise to the sur- 
face, where they float. It has been suggested that this remark- 
able property might be turned to account in medicine, and Dr 
Hamilton states that the tincture of the bark of the root, is an 
intense narcotic ; and that he has employed it with great suc- 
cess, introduced into the hollow of carious teeth, to relieve 
toothach. A decoction of the bark, according to Barham, 
cures the mange in dogs. 
2. Piscidia Carthaginensis. Mountain Dogwood. 
Leaflets broad-lanceolate, racemes subsimple axil- 
lary and subterminal, legumes samaroideal scarcely 
stipitate with the wings cohering in pairs. 
Piscidia foliis oblongo-ovatis pinnatis, siliquis compressis ob- 
longis, Browne , 297. — P. Carthaginensis, Lunan, Hort. Jain. 
I. 270. — Jacq. Am. 210 ? 
HAB. St Andrew’s lower hills. Clarendon and Vere, Lu* 
van. 
FL. June. 
A tree, 15-20 feet, or more, in height : branches spreading 
towards their extremities compressed, angulose, glabrous. 
Leaflets 3-jugate with an odd one 4-5 inches long, petiolulated, 
broad-lanceoiate, acuminate, acute at the base, thin, membra- 
naceous, glabrous and light green above, minutely puberulous 
and paler beneath. Stipules a green glandulose spot. Ra- 
cemes axillary and subterminal, subsolitary, shorter than the 
leaf ; common peduncle angulose ; branchlets short, about a 
line in length, filiform, bearing 2-3 shortly pedicelled pale red- 
dish-purpurascent flowers, with a pair of minute bracteas about 
