after the Japs had captured that island. I shared the seed with the 
Fairchild Tropical Garden and a good many young trees from it have 
been distributed over South Florida. This species-seems to be iden- 
tical with P. erinaceus (described in Hutchinson & Dalziel: “Flora of 
West Tropical Africa”) dnd I recently received some fresh seed under 
this identification from Accra, Gold Coast Colony. I hope to be suc- 
*. cessful in germinating it and producing a lot more of these beautiful 
trees, Hutchinson & Dalziel says: “To 40-50 feet. Often covered 
with golden yellow flowers when quite leafless.” 
PTEROCARPUS MARSUPIUM. As the two preceding represent 
Burma and the Philippines, so P. marsupium represents India. Prized 
for the kino gum which it produces when wounded, as well as for its 
lovely one-half inch yellow flowers in enormous masses, the Pterocarpus 
trees of India were slaughtered over a period of many years and large 
specimens are rare now even in its native land. In the United States 
the species is unknown, though it thrives at the Harvard Botanical 
Garden in Cuba. It is described by Ida Colthurst in “Familiar Flow- 
ering Trees in India” as follows: 
“The Indian variety P. marsupium nearly became extirpated ex- 
cept in inaccessible forest tracts, but is again being vigorously culti- 
vated. It is a tree of remarkable economic utility, attaining a magnifi- 
cent size and yielding beams 20 feet long and 1% feet square. The 
very durable close-grained wood takes an exquisite polish and conse- 
quently is admirably suited for furniture. The rough outer bark ex- 
foliates in heavy scales, and from the rusty inner bark flows a copious 
gum resin, which is obtained by making V-shaped incisions and col- 
lecting the sap in shallow pans where it is allowed to dry into the 
astringent, very brittle, ruby-red mass which is the true Kino of 
commerce, employed medicinally and in dyeing and tanning processes. 
“The leaves appear in great profusion, dark-green and shining and 
growing gracefully in long alternate plumes comprised of irregularly 
opposite leaflets, covering the tree almost from summit to base. 
“The fugitive bloom, appearing when the year is young, also 
loads the branches with great spreading panicles of fairly large and 
clawed yellow flowers, very highly scented and in the forest having 
the remarkable quality of all blooms opening on the same day on 
every tree in the neighborhood; all day the air is a sensory intoxi- 
cation while in their vicinity; at dusk the flowers fall, forming, by 
morning, a thick yellow carpet under the trees. 
“The pod is flat and compressed marginally, with the seeds in the 
centre, 2 or 3 only at most and each in a separate compartment. 
Ordinarily trees and plants are most extravagant in the matter of seed 
production, but in the Pterocarpus as the fruit ripens, one only of the 
cells develops and one only of the ovules is converted into a winged 
seed, whose form has suggested the generic name, pteron meaning a 
wing and karpos a seed. This heritage of winged appendages is not a 
val 
