Note 101 — IV. CONCERNING INDIA THE LESS.[71]

Cassia fistula of Linnæus, if that be what is meant, is found in the Travancore forests, and probably all over India. Its beautiful, pendulous racemes of yellow flowers, shewing something like a Brobdignag laburnum, make it a favourite in the gardens of Upper India. It affords a laxative medicine, and is given by Milburn among the exports of western India. The long, cylindrical pods, sometimes two feet long, probably give the specific name. It is possible, however, that the bishop did not mean C. fistula, but cassia lignea, an inferior cinnamon, which grows in Malabar forests, and was at one time largely exported from Calicut and the other ports. Barbosa mentions it as canella selvatica. Linschoten says that it was worth only about one-fifth of the Ceylon cinnamon. It is perhaps the cassia of Pliny. It is remarkable however that he says the choice cassia was called by the barbarians by the name of lada; and lada is the generic name which the Malays give to all the species of pepper, the word signifying pungent. (See Drury; Crawfurd’s Malay Dict.; and Bohn’s Pliny, xii, 43.)