358 PLANTS FROM WHICH SENNA LEAVES ARE OBTAINED. 
ART. LXXXIX. — ON THE PLANTS FROM WHICH SENNA 
LEAVES ARE OBTAINED. 
By J. B. Batka. 
As I intend to notice only the officinal sorts of senna- 
leaves, as being by their medicinal qualities best known 
and distinguished, I may be permitted to make a separate 
genus of Senna. The fact that none of the officinal sorts 
actually possess the glands mentioned by Forskal and De 
Candolle, and that the genus Senna is distinguished from 
the other species referred by De Candolle to Cassia by the 
peculiar form of the ./rui7s(folliculi), their dissepiment a and 
seeds will justify this proceeding. 
Although senna is one of the best known and frequently 
employed medicines, botanists have not yet succeeded in 
making out the confused synonyms of the genus; and I 
myself should not have been able to have done so but for 
the abolition of the monopoly which the government of 
Egypt held for so many years. This has given me the 
opportunity of becoming separately acquainted with the 
different species and their fruits, of which formerly Alexan- 
drian senna was made up at Boulac, near Cairo. For 
several years past the various sorts of senna-leaves with 
their follicles have been obtained unmixed directly from 
the places where they grew. Formerly the follicles were 
in part picked out and sold separately under the name of 
Folliculi Sennae ; and as it was not known to which leaves 
these isolated follicles belonged, no judgment could be 
formed of those which were found in Alexandrian senna. 
The following senna-leaves are imported to us from the 
East : 
1. From Alexandria, under the name of JJpalto Senna, 
the mixture consisting of three different species of senna and 
of the Cynanchum Jirgel, discovered by Nectoux and 
Deile. 
