in botany; a genus of the monogynia order, belonging to the hexandra clas of plants. The calyx is triphyllous; the corolla tripetalous; the capsule carnosus, trivalved, and monospermous. There is but one species, the gummiifera, or gum eleo. This is frequent in woods in most of the Bahama islands, and grows speedily to a great height and thickness. The bark is brown, and very like the birch of Britain. The wood is soft and useless, except when pieces of the limbs are put into the ground as fences, when it grows readily, and becomes a durable barrier. The leaves are pinnate, the middle rib five or six inches long, with the pinnae set opposite to one another on footstalks half an inch long. It has yellow flowers, male and female on different trees. These are succeeded by purple-coloured berries bigger than large peas, hanging in clusters on a stalk of about five inches long, to which each berry is joined by a footstalk of half an inch long. The seed is hard, white, and of a triangular figure, inclosed within a thin capsule, which divides in three parts, and discharges the seed. The fruit, when cut, discharges a clear balsam or turpentine, esteemed a good vulnerary, particularly for horses. On wounding the bark, a thick milky liquor is obtained, which soon concretes into a resin no way different from the gum eleo of the shops (See Amyris). Dr Browne, and after him Linnaeus, have, according to Dr Wright, mistaken the bark of the roots for the mimarouba, which is a species of Quassia.