Note 35 — CHAPTER 27

[Sir D. Prain, who has kindly investigated this flower, identifies it with a species of Bauhinia. He remarks that “B. acuminata, which differs from B. purpurea and B. variegata, both in being a smaller plant and in beginning to flower when B. variegata does, goes on flowering all through the rains, and still continues to flower when B. purpurea is in blossom. It does not flower all the year round in Bengal, and I doubt if it does so in Rājputāna, though Balfour in his Cyclopaedia suggests that it does so. My idea is that the term bārah-māsha in Upper India should not be taken too literally, and that it is only a figurative way of saying that the particular Bauhinia is in flower alongside of both the others when flowering seasons are separated by half the year.”]