Nephelium
(an ancient name for Burdock, and applied to this genus on account of the rough fruits, which somewhat resemble those of Burdock). SYNS. Dimocarpus (in part), Euphoria (in part). ORD. Sapindaceae. This genus comprises about a score species of handsome stove, evergreen trees, natives of the West Indies, the Indian Archipelago, and Australia. Flowers small, in axillary and terminal many-flowered panicles. Fruit globose or ovoid, smooth, or tubercled or warted, often edible. Leaves alternate, exstipulate, abruptly pinnate; leaflets entire or rarely serrate, in one species stipule-like. The species (of which the two here described are, in all probability, the only ones introduced) thrive in a good, well-drained, turfy loam, and, during the season of growth, like an occasional watering with liquid manure. Propagated by seeds, or by cuttings made of half-ripened wood.
N. Lit-chi (Lee Chee). fl. white, racemose, loose, forming a panicle. May. fr. a berry, cordate, scaly, disposed in loose racemes, red on one side and green on the other, containing a delicious white, sweet, sub-acid pulp, and a large seed. l., leaflets three or four pairs, tapering to both ends, lanceolate, glaucous beneath. South China, 1786, widely cultivated in the tropics. N. Longana (Longan). fl. white, in loose panicles. May. fr., berries globose, almost smooth, with a yellowish, smooth skin; pulp white, tart, and juicy. l., leaflets three pairs. h. 20ft. India, &c., 1786, cultivated in the tropics. (B. M. 4096.) This species is regarded by Bentham and Hooker as the type of the genus Euphoria.
N. verticillatum (whorled). A synonym of Sapindus Danura.