60
LEGUMINOS-*-
Orient , 1 in southern Asia 2 where ten species occur, in China 3 and Japan , 4 Australia , 5 New Zealand ,the Hawaiian Islands , 7 Chile , 8 and tropical 9 and southern Africa . 10 It once existed in Europe , wheretraces of Sophora Europcea are common in the rocks of the lower Miocene period . 11
The genus has not many useful properties. In China a drug prepared from the roots and leavesof Sophora tomentosa is used in large quantities as a tonic and diuretic ; 12 and a yellow dye is mad efrom the pods of Sophora Japonica, while the flower-buds of this species, which form an importantarticle of commerce, are used to dye cloth yellow and blue cloth green, and in astringent remedies-The leaves have been successfully used, it is said, as a cathartic. The seeds of the Texas and Mesican Sophora secundiflora contain a poisonous alkaloid, Sophoria, which possesses strong narcoticproperties, and are believed to have supplied the Indians of Texas with a means of intoxication . 14 ^h eHawaiian Sophora chrysophylla 15 produces hard, durable, and very valuable timber, and the woodthe New Zealand and Chilian Sophora tetraptera 16 is distinguished for its great strength, toughness,and elasticity . 17
Many species of Sophora are valuable ornamental plants. Sophora Japonica™ which was onethe first Asiatic trees introduced into Europe , is now a familiar inhabitant of the gardens and parksof all temperate regions, and several species of the section Edwardsia, natives of New Zealand , Chil e ?and the Hawaiian Islands, and distinguished principally by their winged legumes, are sometim eScultivated in European gardens , 19 where the Indian Sophora glauca 20 and S. heptaphylla ' 11 are als°occasionally seen.
1 Bunge, Boissier FI. Orient, ii. 628, 629 (Goebelia and Keyser-lingia).
2 Wight & Arnott, Prodr. FI. Ind. 179. —Thwaites, Enum. PLZeylan. 04. — Hooker f. FI. Brit. Ind. ii. 248.
8 Franehet, PI. David, i. 100. — Hemsley, Jour. Linn. Soc. xxiii.
201.
4 Thunberg, FI. Jap. 178. — Miquel, Prol. FI. Jap. 241. — Max-imowicz, Bull. Acad. Sci. St. Petersbourg, xviii. 398 (Mel. Biol. ix.
71). — Franehet & Savatier, Enum. PI. Jap. i. 113.
6 Bentham, FI. Austral, ii. 274.
6 Hooker f. FI. New Zealand , i. 52.
7 Hillebrand, FI. Haw . Is. 108.
8 C. Gay, FI. Chid. ii. 214 (Edwardsia).
9 Oliver, FI. Trop. Afr. ii. 253.
10 Harvey & Sonder, FI. Cap. ii. 265.
11 Saporta, Origine Paleontologique des Arbres, 314.
12 Smith, Chinese Mat. Med. 202.— Maiden, Useful Native Plantsof Australia , 204.
18 Smith, l. c. 201.
14 H. C. Wood, Phil. Med. Times, Aug. 4,1877. — Rothroek, Bot.
Gazette, ii. 133. — Nat. Dispens. ed. 2, 1333. — Havard , Proc. U. S.
Nat. Mus. viii. 500.
15 Seemann, Fi. Vit. 66. — Hillebrand, FI. Haw . Is. 108.
Edwardsia chrysophylla, Salisbury, Trans. Linn. Soc. ix. 299, t.
26, f. 1.
16 Aiton, Hort Kew. ii. 43. — Bot. Mag. 167. — Nouveau Duha-mel, iii. 82, t. 20.
17 Kirk, Forest FI. New Zealand , 84, t. 50, 51, 52.
18 Linnaeus, Mant. 68. — Nouveau Duhamel, iii. 84, t. 21. — DeCandolle , Prodr. ii. 95. — Miquel, Prol. Fl.Jap.H&l. — Franehet& Savatier, Enum. PI. Jap. i. 113. — Franehet, PI. David, i. 100. —
Hemsley, Jour. Linn. Soc. xxiii. 202.
S. Sinica, Trochereau, Jour. Phys. xiv. 248.
Styphnolobium Japonicum, Schott, Wien . Zeitschr. 1830, 844.
Sophora Japonica was sent to Europe from China by the Pered’Incarville in 1747 (Guerrapain, Notice sur la Culture du Sophora,
of
du Platane et de VAune. — Desfontaines, Hist. Arb. ii. 258) 811was planted by Bernard de Jussieu in the garden of the FTrianon several years before it reached England, where it wastroduced by the nurseryman James Gordon in 1753 (Aiton, B° r ^Kew. ii. 45). It first flowered in Europe in 1779 in the gardenthe Marshal de Noailles at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, and Wsame year in that of the Petit Trianon at Versailles .
Sophora Japonica appears to be indigenous to northern, centra >and western China , and is cultivated on a considerable scale in son>eparts of the empire for its flower-buds. It is supposed tobeen introduced into Japan, where, however, Rein (Japan nReisen und Studien im Auftrage der Koniglich Preussischen R e 9 {erung, ii. 297) found it scattered over the entire country, especialin the broad-leaved forests of the north.
In the United States , where Sophora Japonica is hardy 0 snorth as eastern New England, and in Europe , it forms a handsou*
bro» a
It
tree sometimes forty or fifty feet in height, with a dense
head of bright green branches and dark lustrous foliage-
valuable as an ornamental plant from the fact that its white
e Teat
do-
ers, produced in loose panicles at the end of the branches, a PPin August when few trees are in blossom. A variety with P eU ^lous branches is common in gardens (Loudon, Arb. Brit. ii. 5®^*The wood of Sophora Japonica is pale brown, tough, and duraalthough light and coarse-grained, the layers of annual g r °"being marked by broad bands of open cells. When first ctl1 ^possesses cathartic properties which make it dangerous to Wuntil thoroughly seasoned (Nouveau Duhamel, l. cl).
19 Bot. Mag. 1.1442,3735. — Bot. Reg. 738,1798. — Card. Ch*>*
Manud
n. ser. ix. 729. — Nicholson, Diet. Gard. — Naudin,VAcclimateur, 502.
20