558 BRYONY. 
Indian species, which do not seem to have yet 
been introduced to Britain, rostrata, scabra, and 
callosa, are likewise used by the natives for medi- 
cinal purposes; and the first and second of these 
are used also as potherbs, while the bitter seeds 
of the third are administered for some diseases 
of horses, and likewise yield a fixed oil which 
the poor people consume in their lamps. 
BRYONY (Buack),—botanically Tamus. A 
small genus of hardy, deciduous, dicecious, twin- 
| ing plants, constituting of itself a tribe or order 
in the Jussieuan system. The plants have large 
tuberous roots, heart-shaped leaves, and racemes 
of small axillary flowers. The common species, 
Tamus communis, grows wild on the sides of 
| hedges in various parts of England. Its root is 
‘| fleshy and very large, and has a dark brown skin 
or cover; its stem is smooth and twining, and 
| usually rises to the height of ten or twelve feet ; 
its leaves are heart-shaped, lucid green, and 
alternate ; its flowers are produced in long 
racemes from the side of the stems, and appear 
from May till August; and its berries are oval, 
smooth, and red. The Cretan species, Zamus 
cretica, was discovered in the island of Crete by 
| Dr. Tornfort, and sent thence to Britain in 1739. 
Its root is rounder than that of the common 
species; its stem has a height of only about five 
or six feet; and its leaves are three-lobed.—The 
| roots of both species are purgative and danger- 
| ous ; and the whole plant of the common species 
| is medicinal. 
BRYOPHYLLUM. A curious greenhouse 
plant, of the houseleek or crassula tribe. It 
constitutes of itself a genus, and takes for its 
specific name calycinum or large-cupped; but it 
was formerly classed as a navelwort, and called 
Cotyledon calycinum. It was brought to Britain, 
about 46 years ago, from the Hast Indies. It 
-possesses the remarkable property of budding 
from the margin of its leaves, and takes from 
this circumstance its botanical name, which 
signifies a leaf-plant. Its leaves are succulent, 
oblong, and sometimes pinnated, and have a 
deeply crenelled border; and when placed in 
a warm, moist, shady situation, they form buds 
and young plants from their crenels. The flowers 
| have a greenish-purple colour, are large and pen- 
dulous, grow in panicles, and appear from May 
till July. The whole plant has usually a height 
of about two feet. 
BUBON. A genus of plants, partly herbaceous 
| and partly shrubby, of the umbelliferous order. 
But it is one of the most unsettled genera in the 
whole circle of systematic botany ; and all the 
| species assigned to it by one class of botanists 
are distributed by others among the genera 
|| athamanta, seseli, selinum, ferula, and galbanum. 
One of the species longest and most steadily re- 
garded as a bubon is the Macedonian, Buon 
macedonicum, called by Sprenzel Athamanta mace- 
donica, and popularly Macedonian parsley. Its 
| root grows almost horizontally, and spreads near 
the species are gummiferous, and emit an odour 
i re eT = = = ut 
the surface of the ground; its leaf-stalks grow 
numerously from its root, and ramify into subor- 
dinate leaf-stalks ; its leaves are smooth, rhomb- 
shaped, serrated, and of a bright pale green 
colour; its flower-stem rises from the centre of 
the plant to a height of about two feet, and 
ramifies into numerous pedunculous branches ; its 
flowers are produced in umbels at the ends of 
the branches, have a whitish or pale yellow 
colour, and appear from June till August; and 
its seeds are oblong and hairy, and ripen in 
autumn. ‘This plant was introduced from Greece 
to Great Britain toward the close of the 16th 
century; and it is a true biennial in its native 
country, but does not seed in Britain till the 
third or fourth year after sowing.—Several of 
precisely similar to that of the gum galbanum 
of our drug-shops; and one of these has been 
very generally, indeed almost universally, re- 
garded as the source whence that gum is ob- | 
tained. See the article Gatpanum. The gum- 
bearing species, Bubon gummiferum, is an econ- 
omical plant of the Cape of Good Hope, and was 
introduced thence to Britain in the third decad 
of last century. It is an evergreen shrub of 
seven or eight feet in height, and produces pale 
yellow umbelliferous flowers in July; and it re- 
quires with us to be cultivated in the greenhouse. 
The gum-bearing variety of the stiff-leaved spe- 
cies, Bubon rigidum gummiferum, was introduced 
from the Crimea about 40 years ago; and it isa 
biennial of about three feet in height, and bears 
pink flowers from July till September. The gal- 
banum species, Bubon galbanum, called by Spren- 
zel Selinum galbanum, is an evergreen, tender 
shrub, of about six feet in height, and was in- 
troduced from the Cape of Good Hope toward 
the close of the 16th century. The buchtorn 
species, Bubon buchtornense, called by Hornemann 
Athamanta rigida, is a recently introduced orna- | 
mental Siberian biennial. The other species 
possess little interest. 
BUBROMA. See Bastarp CEpar. 
BUCHU.—botanically Diosma crenata. A 
small, evergreen, medicinal and ornamental shrub, 
of the order Rutaceze. Some botanists assign it 
to the genus agathosma, and some to baryosma, 
but most to diosma. Its flowers are axillary and 
solitary. Its leaves, which are the parts em- 
ployed in medicine, are produced in nearly a 
verticillate manner, on the extreme twigs of the 
shrub; they are petiolate, and sometimes op- 
posite, but most frequently alternate; they have 
a leathery consistence, a pointedly ovate - lan- 
ceolate form, and a crenated margin; they are 
about an inch long and half an inch in extreme 
breadth ; and they have a smooth and beautifully 
bright green upper surface, and a pale and trans- 
lucently glandular under surface. When dried, 
they appear to an inexperienced eye to be ex- | 
ceedingly similar to the leaves of senna; they 
emit a strong and not unpleasant aromatic odour ; | 
| 
