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Botanical Name. Eremoottms, from the Greek eremos, desert, and Citrus; 
glauca, the Latin for grey or sea-green, in reference to the colour of the leaves and plant 
generally. 
Vernacular NrtHie.- ' Wild Lemon," from the acid nature of its fruit, but 
it is a name which it shares with others. It has also been called " Desert Kumquat " 
and " Wild Lime," but these are less in use. 
Aboriginal Names. - -Dr. Roth gives two names used by Queensland aborigines, 
viz., " Wumbanyi" (Boulia) and " Kandutal" (Cloncurry). 
Synonyms and Affinities. I- Triphasia glauca Lindley, in Mitchell's 
Journey into Trop. Australia, p. 353. 
Mitchell says (under date 17th October, 1846), p. 353, " The thermometer stood 
as low as the freezing point this morning, and the day was cooled by a wind from the 
north-east. In crossing Possession Creek . . . (this is a few miles from Roma, Q. 
J.H.M.) ... a small shrub, 3 feet high, with narrow, blunt, glaucous leaves, 
tasting like rum. A small fruit, with the fragrance of an orange, proved to be a new 
species of Triphasia." 
2. Atalantia glauca Hook, f., in Benth. and Hook., Genera Plantarum, 305. 
See B. Fl. i, 370, where Bentham points out that as a species of Atalantia ' . . . 
although anomalous in some respects, ( it) has the foliage and inflorescence of Atalantia, 
and is allied in several respects to A. Hindsii Oliv., approaching like that species to 
Citrus in the increased number of stamens." (For a reference to Oliver's paper, which 
takes cognisance of some species of Atalantia, see Journ. Linn. Soc. (Bot.), v, 23 (1861).) 
Dr. Swingle separates Atalantia from Eremocitrus as follows : 
From true Atalanlias, such as A. monophytta (Roxb.) DC. and A. citrioidcs 
Pierre, having 2- to 4-celled fruits with pulp vesicles, Eremocitrus differs in having the 
stamens four times as numerous as the petals instead of twice as numerous. It also 
differs markedly from Atalantia in the structure of the leaves. 
Fruit. Mr. F. S. Carne, Fairfield, Roma, Queensland (practically the type 
locality), in a letter to Mr. W. M. Carne (then on the staff of the National Herbarium, 
Sydney), dated 13th December, 1914, says, " I find it flowers in early spring, August, 
and the fruit is ripe in December and falls to the ground almost immediately. Odd 
trees fruit earlier and some also very much later, but these are very rare. I have never 
found the lemon and mandarin-shaped fruit growing on the same tree, and indeed only 
rarely are both kinds of fruits seen in the same clump." 
The recipient of the letter adds, " As a result of examining three different samples 
of Atalantia glauca fruit, it is evident that 
1. The plants are shy-seeders. Over 50 per cent, (even 100 per cent.) of fruits 
do not contain seed. No more than two se3ds yet found in each fruit. 
2. Over 30 per cent, are affected by an insect a moth which appears to form 
galls on the placentas, probably resulting in the destruction of the ovules. 
