XXXF*.—AURANTIACEÆ.
This very beautiful, and on account of its fragrant flowers and delicious fruit, much admired
order, of which the orange with its numerous varieties of lemons, limes, citroqs, pumplemoses,
&c. form the type, is generally well known in India (to which country indeed it almost exclusively
belongs) even to the most casual observers of plants. But though so generally known in
its more perfect forms, it is not always easy to recognize those more remote from the type of
the family. , | , , _ 1 , , ,
The order generally is composed of handsome flowering eyer-green trees and shrubs, occasionally
armed with strong spines, abounding in glands filled with volatile oil, usually very conspicuous
in the leaves when held between the eye and the light, and exhaling a fragrant odour.
Their leaves are alternate, simple, or compound. In the former as in the latter instance the petipis
are minted, indicating a tendency to become compound. So constantly is this the case, that
simple leave’s with such petiols are sometimes described as “ pinnate reduced to the terminal leaflet,”
The petiols are often dilated or wingecfe. The flowers are bisexual, for the most part white,
variously arranged in solitary and axillary flowers, or in racemes, panicles, corymbs, &c.
The calyx is short, more or less urceolate, or campanulate at the base, 3^5 lobed, withering.
Petals equalling the number of the lobes of the calyx and alternate with‘them, inserted outside
of the torus, broad at the base, distinct, or sometimes cohering, deciduous, imbricated in æstiva-
tion. Stamens equal or double the number of the petals, or more rarely, are: vpry numerous
and indefinite, inserted in a single series into the torus : filaments compressed, either
altogether free or united into a tube, or variously polyadelphous, subulate, and free at the
point. Anthers 2?celled, attached by the base, or the middle of the back, dehising longitudi.
nally, introrsé. Ovary free, 2-3-5 or many celled, with one or several ovules in each. Style
cylindrical, or rarely wanting. Stigma large, somewhat lobed, or flat and spread oyer the apex
of the ovary. “ Fruit'(an orange) consisting of several (or 1 by abortion) membranacious
carpels, with or without an internal pulp, and surrounded by a thickish indéhiscent rind,
abounding in vesicles full of volatile oil. Seeds attached to the inner angle of the carpels,
solitary, or numerous, usually pendulous : raphe and chalaza usually very conspicuous : Albumen
none. Embryo straight, radicle next the hilum, partly concealed within the cotyledons. Cotyledons
large, thick and amygdaline.”
A ffinities. The plants of this order are most readily known by the number of oily receptacles,
which are dispersed all over them ; the leaves, sepals, petals, and fruit equally partaking
of them ; by their deciduous petals, and compound leaves, and frequently winged petiols.
By these peculiarities they are nearly related to Amyrideoe and Zanthoxylacece;, from neither of
which is it always easy to distinguish them, except by the fruit. Several species referred by
Roxburgh 'to his genus Amyris, actually belong to this order. From the former they are distinguished
by the numerous, not solitary, cells of the ovary, and by their baccate, not drupa-
cious, or samaroid, or legume-like fruit : from the latter their bi, not usually unisexual flowers,
and their indéhiscent pulpy fruit, not 2-valved dehiscent capsules seated on a gynophore, with a
solitary shining black seed.
G eographical D istribution. Tropical Asia and her islands seem to be the native
country of the order, a few only having been found indigenous elsewhere, of these two or three
are from Madagascar, an island in which many other associates of the Indian Flora are (found.
De Candolle in his Prpdromus, excluding Aglaea, enumerates 43 species for the whole order:
G. Don, who published some years later, raises the number to 60, but many of these doubtful :
Blume found 21 in Java: Wallich’s list has 37 : and 24 are described in our Prodromus as
natives of the Indian Peninsula : one or two have been since added to the Peninsular list and
I have several spécies from Ceylon, and some from Mergui. One species only, is found to withstand
exposure to frost and snow, the Limonia lauriola, Wallich (PI. As. rar,) which is found
onthe tops of cold and iofty mountains, where it is for some months of the year buried under
the snow.
P r o p e r t ie s and U s e s . The properties of the orange in all its protean forms of lemon,
lime citron, pumplemose, bergamot, &c. are too well known to require notice here, but it is not
generally known, that the pulp of the wood-apple (Feroni'a elephantum) affords a very
pleasant jelly, so closely resembling black currant jelly that it is only to be distinguished
by a slight degree of astringency which it communicates to the taste. In common with that of
most of the order, the wood of this tree is very hard and durable, and not the less valuable for
being found in most parts of India. T he tree itself, is tall and handsome, with a straight trunk
and a fine head, but the branches do not spread much. AEgle Marmelos equally attains the sizé
of a considerable tree. I have not heard of the wood of this plant being used as timber, probably
Owing to the respect in which the fruit is held by the Hindoos. It is most frequently
met with in pagoda gardens, the following extract from Roxburgh’s Flora Indica, vol., 2 page 580,
will explain the reason of the preference given to this species,
p This is the Bilva or Matura of the Asiatic Researches, vol! 2 page 349, from whence the
following is an extract. ‘ Uses. The fruit,is nutritious, warm, cathartic; in taste delicious, in
fragrance exquisite; its aperient, and detersive quality, and its efficacy in removing habitual
costiveness, have been proved by constant experience. The mucus of the seed is for some
purposes a very good cement.’ Note—‘ This fruit is called Shreephula because it sprang, say
the Indian poets from the milk of Shree, the goddess of abundance, who bestowed it on mankind
at the request of Jöwarra, whence he alone wears a chaplet of Bilva flowers, to him only
the Hindoos offer them ; and when they see any of them fallen on the ground, they take them
up with reverence, and carry them to his temple.’
The root, bark, leaves, and'»'flowers are reckoned refrigerants by the Malabar physicians.
The ripe fruit they esteem most wholesome.”.
As an ornamental garden shrub the Murraya exotica is much cultivated in this country,
and well merits the distinction both on account of the beauty of the shrub itself, and the profusion
and fragrance of its flowers; as a cultivated plant it rarely produces seed. Murraya pani-
culata which seems scarcely distinct is frequent in our jungles. The oranges, limes, and pumplemoses,
are frequently cultivated in this country on .account of their fruit, but the former very
rarely with success on the plains, in Coromandel. The cause of this want of success is not ascertained,
but I am myself disposed to attribute it to the heat being too high during the period
of thèir ripening their fruit, for it is well known, that in the valleys at the foot of the Ghauts
where the cold is much greater during that season of the year, they arrive at great perfection.
The fed, loose skinhed orange, which arrives at so great perfection in the alpine tracts of
the Circars, and which is equally found on the mountains of the south, (but very inferior) is só
very tenacious of an alpine country, that it has in the Circars received the name of hill orange<
This, to my taste, when in perfection, is by far the most dèlicious of the whole tribe, but judging
from the nature of the climate in which it is said to arrive at its greatest perfection, (a cold
very humid atmosphere) it seems next to impQSsible to rear it successfully on the plains. It
must be recollected, that the orange for the most part ripens its fruit during the cold season,
showing that to attain perfection it requires a considerable range of the thermometer, the heat
in their favourite valleys being high during thé day, but low during the night, supplies this desideratum.
I may here mention on the authority of the late Dr. Turner that the juice of the
lemon, lime and citron, contains a large quantity of citric, and that of thé orange malic acid.
Respecting the other species of the order a few words will suffice. Dr. Ainslie Mat. Ind. vol.
2 page 86-87, speaks very favourably of the medicinal properties of AEgle marmelos under the
name Cratceva, adding however, that he has never seen the-species, which is rather remarkable
as it is to be met with in almost every pagoda garden. He informs us that a decoction of the
bark of the root is considered on the Malabar coast a sovereign remedy against various forms
of disease originating in indigestion, and that the fruit, a little unripe, is given in diarrhma and
dysentery: and Roxburgh (cor. plants) states that the Dutch in Ceylon prepare a perfume
from the rind.
The leaves of the Bergera Königii which are very fragrant, are much used by the natives
as a seasoning for their curries, and are supposed stomachic and tonic. An infusion of thé
dried leaves is said to stop vomiting.
The young leaves of Feronia elephantum have a delightful fragrance resembling anise,
hence they are considered stomachic and carmiinatine. From wounds in the bark of this tree
a very transparent gum exudes, having the properties of gum arabic, and is said to be better
suited than it, for mixing colours for the painter.