228 
SPICES 
CHAP. 
stout short style and a small bilobed stigma. The fruit 
resembles that of the true cinnamon, but is rather smaller. 
It is black, pulpy, and aromatic, elliptic in outline, and 
seated in a cup lobed at the edge, the remains of the 
perianth. It contains a single seed. 
The flowers are fertilised by flies chiefly, and the 
seed is dispersed by birds, which swallow the pulpy 
fruit as soon as it is ripe. The dried fruits are known 
as Cassia buds. 
HISTORY 
Cassia has been known from the earliest times as a 
spice. It is mentioned constantly in the Bible, and by 
many of the early Greek authors, and in Chinese herbals 
as early as 2700 B.c. A great part of this early recorded 
bark was undoubtedly the Chinese Cassia, especially as 
the Arabian and Persian name for the bark is Darachini, 
from Dar, wood, and Ghini, Chinese. At the same time 
the Indian Tamala, or Tajpat, and the Malay barks may 
have been also among the oriental imports into Europe 
and Arabia under the name of Cassia. 
The origin of the Chinese bark, however, was un- 
known till 1882. Mr. Ford, Superintendent of the 
Botanical and Afforestation Department of Hongkong, 
made an expedition to the West river. Canton province, 
to report on the cultivation of the plant. His account 
was published in a Report to the Hongkong Govern- 
ment, and also in the Linnean Society s Journal, vol. 
XX. p. 19, by Mr. (now Sir) W. Thiselton Dyer, in a 
note on the origin of Cassia lignea. 
Cassia was known in Western Europe as early as the 
seventh century, and is mentioned in medical books in 
England before the Norman conquest. It was sold as 
Can el in England in 1264 at lOd. per lb., and in the 
fifteenth century was mentioned in the Bohe of Nurture, 
by John Russell, as resembling cinnamon, but being in- 
ferior. 
