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Simarubeae (Genus comprising about)

A genus comprising about fourteen species of stove, evergreen or deciduous trees or shrubs, natives of South America. Flowers small or rather large; calyx small, four or five-lobed; petals four or five, longer than the calyx, spreading, valvate; disk narrow, erect; stamens eight to ten, included; panicles loose-flowered, short or elongated. Carpels one to five, drupaceous, the endocarp usually hard. Leaves alternate, impari-or abruptly pinnate, rarely one to three-foliolate; leaflets entire, coriaceous. Three species have been introduced, but S. Cedron is probably the only one now known in cultivation in this country. This is a small tree, remarkable for the febri-fugal properties of its seeds, which have also been, from time immemorial, reputed, in its native place, as a remedy for snake-bites. It thrives in well-drained, turfy loam. Propagated by cuttings of the ripened wood, inserted in sand, under a glass, in heat; or by imported seeds. S. Cedron. Cedron-tree. fl. disposed in racemes 3ft. to 4ft. long. May. fr. about the size of a swan's egg, one-seeded, four of the cells being barren. l. large, pinnate; leaflets twenty or more, narrow-elliptic, livid-green above, paler beneath. Trunk simple, erect, slender. h. 20ft. New Granada, 1846.