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Sophora. | LEGUMINOSAE, 
8. SOPHORA Linn. 
Small trees or shrubs. Leaves imparipinnate. Flowers in racemes or 
panicles, large, showy. Calyx oblique, broadly campanulate; teeth very 
short. Standard broadly obovate or nearly orbicular, erect or spreading ; 
wings oblong, oblique, shorter than the keel. Stamens 10, free or rarely 
obscurely connate at the base; anthers versatile. Ovary shortly stipitate ; 
ovules numerous ; style incurved; stigma minute, terminal. Pod monili- 
form, elongated, terete or 4-winged or -angled, fleshy or coriaceous or 
woody, indehiscent or 2-valved, each seed enclosed in a separate cell. Seed 
oblong to globose, few or many. 
A genus of between 25 or 30 species, mainly from the tropics and the warm 
temperate zones. The New Zealand species -belong to the section Edwardsia, often 
kept as a distinct genus, and which is characterized by the short standard exserted 
stamens, and usually 4-winged pod. 
In the first edition of this work I followed Hooker and Bentham in combining all 
the New Zealand forms under one species, but I am now fully convinced that the 
differences are much too important to be treated in such a manner. 
Young plants without divaricating branches. Pinnae 12-25 
pairs, 3-lin. long. Flowers large, 2in. long. Standard 4 
shorter than the wings .. ye am ih .. IL. S. tetraptera. 
Young plants with divaricating branches. Pinnae 25-40 pairs. 
Hlowers smaller, 14 in. long. Standard as long as the wings .. 2. S. microphylla. 
Branches always divaricating. Pinnae 2-5 pairs. Flowers small, 
2-{in. Standard as long as the wings. Pods small .. 3. 8. prostrata. 
tetra x (yy. QR. | 
|. S. tetraptera (Mill) fc. Plant. (1760) t. 1—A small tree 25-40 ft. 
high, with a trunk ranging from 1 to 2ft. diam.: bark sreyish-brown. 
Branches terete ; branchlets clothed with silky fulvous pubescence. Leaves 
exstipulate, unequally pinnate, 3-6 in. long; pinnae 12-25 pairs, sessile or 
very shortly petioled, 3-1 in. long, linear-oblong, obtuse, often emarginate, 
quite entire, usually clothed on both surfaces with short and fine fulvous 
siuky hairs. Young plants not markedly different in habit or foliage from 
older ones. Flowers in 4-8-flowered axillary racemes, large, 14-2 in. long, 
golden-yellow. Standard + shorter than the wings, broadly oblong or 
oblong-orbicular, shortly clawed at the base, obviously reflexed. Wings 
oblong, obtuse, with comparatively short claws; keel nearly straight. 
Pod pedicelled, 3-8 in. long, 4-winged, jointed, indehiscent. Seeds oblong, 
yellow or yellowish-brown.—Forst. f. Prod. (1786) n. 183 (in part) ; Linn, 
f. Suppl. (1781) 230; Bot. Mag. (1792) t. 167; Ait. Hort. Kew. ed. 1, vol. ll, 
344; Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. (1864), var. grandiflora, 52; T. Kirk 
Students’ Fl. (1899) 122; Cheesem. Man. N.Z. Fl. (1906) 122. Edwardsia 
grandiflora Salisb. in Trans. Linn. Soc. ix (1808) 299 ; 4. Rich. Fl. Nouv. 
Zel. (1832) 344; A. Cunn. Precur. (1839) n. 571; Hook. jf. £l. Nov. Zel. i 
(1853) 52. 
NortH Isntanp: Krom the East Cape southwards to the Ruahine Range, but not 
common. Sea-level to 1500 ft. October. : 
Easily separated from the following species by the larger linear-oblong pinnae, 
which are sometimes quite lin. in length, by the larger flowers, and by the standard 
being considerably shorter than the wings. 
2. S. microphylla/ if Hort Kew. 11 (1789) 43.—A small tree 20-30 ft. 
high ; trunk seldom as much as 3 ft. diam. ; bark greyish-brown. Branch- 
lets clothed with silky fulvous pubescence when young. Leaves unequally 
pinnate; leaflets very numerous, 25-35 pairs, shortly petiolate, small, 
4-3 In. long, rarely more, oblong or obovate, sometimes nearly orbicular, 
4 
obtuse or slightly emarginate, when young clothed with fulvous silky hairs. 
ISO, 
