Cassiinae pt 1 NY-Botanical_gardens_Vol. 35_1 - Copy.pdf - Antbase

1982] CASSIINAE—SENNA 255
is not derived from seeds brought across the Pacific over the Spanish trade route
between Acapulco and Manila. Perhaps a biosystemaric study wUl provide an
answer to these questions. It may be worth menrioning that our study of American
S. obtusifolia confirms Brenan's view that genuine S. tora, which differs in its
usually shorter pedicels, always truncate abaxial anthers and broad areole on the
seeds, is foreign to the New World, ranging from peninsular India and Sri Lanka
to Fiji and Samoa.
The foliage of S. obtusifolia is said to furnish a vegetable, a purgative drug,
and poultices for sores, ulcers and insect-bites. The seeds have been used as a
substitute for or an adulterant of coffee, and furnish a mordant for dyeing blue
cloth. Burkart (1952, p. 169, sub C. tora) mentions a large-seeded form of the
species, distinct from that wUd in Argentina, which is cultivated for its laxative
properties by Japanese settlers under the name of habuso. Not seen by us, it
should be compared with the broad-podded AntUlean-African-Indian forms men-
rioned above which might have reached South America independently from east­
ern Asia. The macerated leaves furnish the Bora Indians of Rio Yaguasyacu in
Loreto, Peru with a dye for Astrocaryum hammocks (Balick et al. 1037, MO).
70. Senna pentagonia (P. Miller) Irwin & Barneby, comb. nov. Cassia pentagonia
P.^Miller, Gard. Diet. ed. 8, Cassia no. 18. 1768.—Typus infra sub
var. pentagonia indicatur.
Coarse erect malodorous monocarpic herbs with habit of S. obtusifolia, at
anthesis 2-24 dm, subcorymbosely few-branched distaUy, appearing glabrous but
the lfts always minutely ciholate and the young stems and lf-stalks often thinly
minutely puberulent, the green membranous lfts glabrous on both faces, paler or
subglaucescent beneath, the inflorescence of axUlary subsessUe 1-2-fld racemes
immersed in foliage or in age forming a small terminal corymb.
Stipules erect Unear- or narrowly lance-attenuate 8-18 x 0.7-2 mm, the thinly
herbaceous blades strongly 1-nerved, deciduous before the If.
Lvs 5-13.5 cm; petiole including discolored pulvinus (1.5-)2-5.5 cm, at middle
0.6-1.6 mm diam, carinate dorsally, openly shallow-sulcate ventraUy; rachis
(1.2-) 1.5-3 cm, usually a Uttie shorter than the petiole; gland between proximal
and rarely also between the second pair of lfts stipitate or subsessile, in profile
(1.3-)2^ mm tall, the narrowly lance-ellipsoid obtuse body 0.3-0.6 mm diam;
pulvinules 1.2-2.5 mm; lfts 3 pairs, accrescent upward, the distal pair broadly
obovate or subrhombic-obovate, obtuse mucronate or obscurely deltate-acuminulate
(2.2-)2.5-6 x 1.3-2.6 cm, 1.4-2.4 times as long as wide, the margin and
venation as in S. obtusifolia.
Peduncles 0-3 mm; racemes 1-2-fld, the axis not over 1 mm; bracts lance-
attenuate 3-5 mm, caducous; pedicels at anthesis 13-32 mm, in fruit much thickened
and 14^0 mm; fls of S. obtusifolia, except (as described under vars.) some­
times larger, but the 3 abaxial anthers more strongly beaked, the beak (1-) 1.2-5
mm; ovary strigulose; style almost hnear 3-8 mm; ovules 20-28.
Pod stiffly ascending and slighriy arched outward, the stipe 6-10 mm, the body
5.5-8 cm long, including the wings 8-11 mm diam, the body itself compressed
quadrangular 4-5 mm diam, its cavity divided by complete septa into locules
2.5-4 mm long, the valves stiffly papery, the ridges parallel and approximate to
the sutures produced as papery wings 2.5-4 mm wide; seeds descending obliquely
across the cavity, obovoid compressed usuaUy parallel to the septa, 3.5-4.2 x 2-3
mm, the castaneous sublustrous testa minutely pitted or granular, the Unear or
linear-ellipric areole 2-3 x 0.3-0.6 mm.