THE COTTAGE GARDENEll. 
; armetl. But, Dr. Boyle says he cultivated j^both for 
j several years in India, and found that they retained 
I their characteristic differences when raised from seed, 
and grown in the same place, and under similar circum¬ 
stances. The natives of North India distinguish the un¬ 
armed species as pltoollce (flowering) Hlhendee, hut the 
thorny species they call simply Mliendee. It is this species, 
Lmcsonia qnnosa, which we consider is the Capher of 
the Bible. It contains a very large amount of colouring 
matter, and for this, as well as for its fragrance, is 
largely cultivated near Sidoura, not far from the north¬ 
western bank of the Jumna. Its flowers are white, pow¬ 
erfully fragrant, and in corymbs, or clusters; and so 
coinciding with the biblical simile of the beloved one 
being like “ a cluster of Capher.” 
The Arabic name of hinna or henna, is especially 
applied to this species, and it is described in many of 
their medical works, and in that of Serapion, under 
the title al Jianna, where it is interesting to observe that 
he quotes the description given by Dioscorides of the 
hitpros as applicable to this plant, and w'O are well 
aware that the most authoritative of the ancient Bo¬ 
tanists considered the Inqnos to be identical with the 
caidier of the Scriptures. 
Besides the similarity of the name, observes Dr. Boyle, 
no plant is more likely to have been alluded to in the 
above passage, as no other is more highly esteemed, or 
more frequently employed, than the Hinna, and it would 
appear to have been applied to the same purposes from 
very remote antiquity. Dr. Shaw, in his Travels, p. 
113, bears a similar testimony. He says, “this beau¬ 
tiful, odoriferous plant grows ten or twelve feet high, 
putting out its little flowers in clusters, which yield a 
most grateful smell lihe Campthor. The leaves of this 
plant, after they are dried and powdered, are disposed of 
to an advantage in all the markets of Tunis, for with 
this all the African ladies who can purchase it, tinge 
their lips, hair, hands, and feet; rendering them thereby 
of a tawny saffron colour, which they reckon a great 
beauty.” Bussell, in his Natural History of Aleppo, 
p. 103, and Niebuhr, in his Description of Arabia, p. 57, 
mention that this practice of personal tinting is preva- ! 
lent in those countries, and we know, also, that it is a j 
practice in some parts of India. That it was an ancient 
practice, we have the assurance of Hasselquist, who, in 
his Travels, p. 246, states that he saw in Egypt, that 
the nails of some of the mummies were tinged with the 
Al-hennah. 
We have on more than one occasion in these notes 
referred to the commerce of Palestine with India. That 
commerce, embracing, as it did, a large importation of 
the fragrant products of Hindostan, probably included 
Camphor, and this resembling in its smell that of the 
plant of En-gedi, may have induced the application to 
this plant of the Hindostanee name for Camphor. This 
was the more appropriate if Laivsonia spinosa be the 
Capher of the Bible, because crystals of Camphor, 
o( which its flowers smell, may be obtained from 
it. Iho Dau'sonia is not singular in thus yielding. 
OcTor.KU- 10, 
Camphor, because, besides being obtained from many 
foreign plants, it is also a product of our native Thyme, 
Marjoram, Juniper, Bosemary, Sage, and Peppermint. 
The October Meeting of the Entomological Society took 
place on the 1st instant, the President, J. Curtis, Esq., 
F.L.S., being in the chair. The Secretary announced 
the receipt of an extensive series of donations to the 
library from the Boyal Academy of Brussels, the Impe¬ 
rial Society of Moscow, the Society of Arts, the Liver¬ 
pool Literary Society, Messrs. Zuchold, Hewitson, New¬ 
man, &c. 
Mr. E. Smith exhibited a collection of rare Coleoptera, 
captured by himself at Deal, during the past month, in¬ 
cluding a number of very rare Curculionidse, also a 
specimen of the curious little &^y,Elachiptera brevipennis, 
which he had observed in the act of depositing its eggs 
in the body of one of the Ciinidicse, Nabis subaptera. 
Mr. Dawson exhibited a series of the hitherto unique 
Harpalus cordatus, from the same locality; and Dr, 
Power, a specimen of Dinodes Maillei, a Carabideous 
beetle, inhabiting Turkey and Greece, but which had 
been taken in moss at Gurnard Bay, near the west 
end of the Isle of Wight, it having been supposed 
to have escaped from some of the numerous vessels 
from the Mediterranean which approach that part of 
the island. Mr. Dawson stated, in support of this 
opinion, that he had seen beetles of great rarity, such 
as Panagmis and Drilu, floating in masses to shore 
near the Needles. 
Mr. Eoxcroft exhibited a box of insects recently cap- 
1 tured in Perthshire; Mr. Bond, the rare Heliophobus 
hispidus, from the Isle of Portland; and Mr. Newman, a 
! specimen of the Xylocopa iricolor, a large, and evidently 
imported kind of bee, at Dulwich. 
Mr. Stainton exhibited a new British species of 
Lithocolletes (one of the Muro-Lepidoptera), reared from 
the leaves of Vida sepium, which still contained speci¬ 
mens, some in the act of producing the perfect insect, 
and others which will not attain to perfection till the 
ensuing spring, He had received a notice of the species 
from a correspondent in Germany, which led him to exa¬ 
mine the leaves of the Yicia, just as he had himself com¬ 
municated a notice of a species which had only been found 
in Britain, to an entomologist at Vienna, who had im¬ 
mediately examined the leaves of the plant which it 
inhabited, and who at once detected it there. 
Mr. Curtis exhibited a gigantic specimen of a scor¬ 
pion from Sierra Leone. 
Mr. Westwood stated that he had received a notice 
from Mr. D. W. Mitchell, the indefatigable Secretary of 
the Zoological Society, of the destruction of a large 
extent of turnips, from the attacks of Apihides, which, in 
their turn, had been consumed by the larvro of the 
Aphidivorous Syphidse. It also stated that ho had ob¬ 
served that the past summer had been extremely favour¬ 
able to the propagation of obnoxious species of Saw 
Elies. He had observed the Hylstoma Ilo&ce, a Bose 
