in botany: A genus of the decandra order, belonging to the diadelphia clas of plants; and in the natural method ranking under the 3rd order, Papilionaceae. The calyx is quinquedentate, the capsule falcated, filiaceous, varicose. The seeds are few and solitary. There are four species, viz. 1. Draco; 2. Erythrophylum; 3. Lunatus; and, 4. Santalinus. This last is by some referred to the genus Santalum. It is called red saunders; and the wood is brought from the East Indies in large billets, of a compact texture, a dull red, almost blackish colour on the outside, and a deep brighter red within. This wood has no manifest smell, and little or no taste. It has been commended as a mild astringent, and a corroborant of the nervous system; but these are qualities that belong only to the yellow sort.

The principal use of red saunders is as a colouring drug; with which intention it is employed in some formulas; particularly in the tinctoria lavandula composita. It communicates a deep red to rectified spirit, but gives no tinge to aqueous liquors; a small quantity of the resin, extracted by means of spirit, tinges a large one of fresh spirit of an elegant blood-red. There is scarcely any oil, that of lavender excepted, to which it communicates its colour. Geoffroy and others take notice, that the Brazil woods are sometimes substituted for red saunders; and the college of Brussel are in doubt whether all that is sold among them for saunders be not really a wood of that kind. According to the account which they have given, their saunders is certainly the Brazil wood; the distinguishing character of which is, that it imparts its colour to water.