7.  Cassia grandis Linnaeus fil., Suppl. 230. 1781.—"Habitat in Surinamo. C. G. Dahlberg."—Based in part on specimens from Surinam, not seen, in part on Cassia fistula brasiliana flore incarnato Breynius, Exot. pl. cent. 58, t. 21 (optima!). 1678.—Cassia brasiliana Lamarck, Encycl. Meth. 1: 649. 1785, nom. illegit. Cathartocarpus grandis (Linnaeus fil.) Persoon, Syn. Pl. 1: 459. 1805. C. brasilianus (Lamarck) Jacquin, Fragm. 58, t. 85, fig. 3 (legumen). 1809. Bactyrilobium grande (Linnaeus fil.) Hornemann, Suppl. Hort. Bot. Havn. 135. 1819.

Cassia brasiliensis Buc’hoz, Hist. Univ. Regne Veg., Planches 10, decas 4: t. 2. 1775.—Without text, but provided with analytical detail, this appears to be the earliest binomial for C. grandis, here passed over on the pretext that binomial nomenclature is not uniformly employed throughout the volume. Buc’hoz described the plant in detail in op. cit. Discours 5: 1777, but inexplicably there equated it with Cassia fistula.

Cassia mollis Vahl, Symb. bot. 3: 57. 1794.—"Habitat in America meridionali. Dn. v. ROHR."— Holotypus, labelled (verso) ‘Cassia mollis. Ex America meridionali mis [it] Dr. von Rohr,’ C (hb. Vahl.)!—Bactyrilobium molle (Vahl) Schrader, Gotting. Gelehrt. Anz. 1: 713. 1821.

Cassia brasiliana var. tomentosa Miquel, Linnaea 18: 578. 1844.—"Colitur in hortis Paramari- boae [Surinam].’—No typus seen, but said to differ from C. brasiliana (=C. grandis) only in relatively dense vesture.

Carthartocarpus erubescens W. Hamilton, "Pharm. J. 5: 119. 1825."—Protologue not seen; cf. Mabberley, Taxon 30(1): 10. 1981.

Cassia pachycarpa De Wit, Webbia 11: 259, fig. 3. 1955.—". . . Carr 11958 in L (SE. New Guinea, Koitaki)."—Holotypus, L, not seen; isotypus, K!—Equated with C. grandis by Verdcourt, Kew Bull. 32(1): 221. 1977.—Based on a plant naturalized in New Guinea, the internal structure of the immature pod misinterpreted.

Cassia brasiliana sensu Colladon, 1816, p. 83; Humboldt, Bonpland & Kunth, 1824, p. 337; DeCandolle, 1825, p. 489; Vogel, 1837, p. 11, exclus. var.; Saldanha da Gama Filho, Config. e descr. org. fundam. das princip. mad. Rio de Jan. 1: 43. 1865.

Cassia grandis sensu Bentham, 1870, p. 93; 1871, p. 515; Perkins, Contrib. U.S. Nat. Herb. 10: 157. 1907; Fawcett & Rendle, 1920, p. 101; Standley, 1922, p. 405; Colthurst, Familiar Fl. Trees India 64. 1924; Pittier, Pl. Usuales Ven. 163. 1926; Pittier, 1928, p. 117; Britton & Rose, 1930, p. 229; Britton & Killip, 1936, p. 169; Ducke, 1939, p. 79; Amshoff, 1939, p. 57; Standley & Steyermark, 1946, p. 116; Schery, 1951, p. 45, fig. 118, exclus. syn. C. regia; De Wit, 1955, p. 213; Neal, In Gardens of Hawaii 424, fig. 175b. 1965; Little, Trees Pto. Rico, second vol. t. 371. 1974; Isely, 1975, p. 98; Graf, Tropica 551. 1978. Cathartocarpus grandis sensu G. Don, 1832, p. 452.

Semideciduous trees of potentially great stature, in age attaining 30 m with trunk up to 7 dm diam breast-high, but flowering when (4-)6 m, the adult crown of foliage broad and rounded, the woody parts foetid when cut or bruised, the livid annotinous branchlets angulate by spurs descending from each lf-scar, the hornotinous branchlets contemporary with the cauliflorous inflorescence as well as all lvs and raceme-axes densely pilosulous with sinuous or straightish spreading-incurved hairs up to 0.2-0.45(-0.6) mm, the newly expanding lvs rusty- tomentulose, the copious distichous adult foliage bicolored, the lfts (dry) brownish-olivaceous and dull or sublustrous above, paler dull beneath, the racemes ascending solitary or paired from nodular spurs on branchlets of second or third year, the fl-buds and sepals pallidy mealy-tomentulose.

Stipules livid triangular-subulate 0.4-1 mm, commonly concealed by vesture and promptly deciduous from their expanding lf, absent from mature foliage.

Adult lvs mostly (12-)15-30(-35) cm, exceptionally some (?shade) lvs 40-53 cm; petiole including livid pulvinus (1.5-)2^k5 cm, a little longer than the first interfoliolar segment of rachis, this 10-25 (rarely 30^15) cm, shallowly openly grooved ventrally, the groove interrupted at each pair of pulvinules these 10-20(-26) mm apart; pulvinules 1.4-2.l(-2.6) mm; lfts (7-)8-17(-21) pairs decrescent proximally and also sometimes a trifle so distally, in outline most often exactly oblong and at apex obtuse, depressed-deltate or emarginate but shorter ones sometimes ovate-oblong and some distal ones oblong-oblanceolate or -elliptic, all at inequilateral base broadly rounded, truncate or subcordate, the longest of a lf 3.5-6.5(-8.3) x 1.2-2.4(-3) cm, 2.5-4(-4.2) times as long as wide, the margins revolute, the midrib canaliculate on upper and cariniform on lower face, the 14-23 rather crowded and widely ascending pairs of camptodrome secondary veins with tertiary and irregular reticular venules all becoming prominulous on both faces, rarely immersed on the upper.

Racemes ascending from the branchlets, but these often drooping and the racemes consequently obliquely geotropic, their early elongating (15-)20-45(-50)- fld axis finally (8-) 10-23(-27) cm, the obtusely obovoid or globose fl-buds early separated and raised well above the several simultaneously expanded fls; bracts and bracteoles firm, pilosulous on both faces, the former ovate, deltate-ovate or lance-acuminate (2-)2.5-5 mm, the latter similar except a little smaller, all caducous as the pedicel beings to elongate; pedicels at full anthesis (8-) 10-20 mm; hypanthium turbinate, not over 1 mm deep, often obscurely differentiated; sepals firm, pallid greenish or pinkish, minutely densely tomentulose on both faces, obovate or oblong-obovate obtuse, early reflexed, the longest (5.5-)6-8.5(-9) mm; petals heteromorphic and of variable color, the vexillary one oblong-elliptic, bent forward, ventrally 2-callose at thickened base of blade and differing from its neighbors in a yellow flare or eye-spot, the rest alike obovate or obovate-flabellate beyond the short claw, the longest petal (8.5-)9-11 mm, all opening pink and fading peach-color, orange-pink or pale yellow, or opening whitish fading creamy, or all opening white except for pink vexillum, in any case drying dull yellowish- tan; filaments glabrous, the 3 sigmoid antesepalous ones 14-22 mm, ± dilated in the long distal curve, the 5 antepetalous erect, slenderly tapering and slightly diminished toward the vexillum (4.5-)5-9 mm, the 2 next the vexillum 1-3 mm, bent backward, the anthers all densely loosely white-pilosulous, those of 3 sigmoid staments (1.5-) 1.7-2.9(-3) x (1.1-) 1.4- 1.9 mm, of 5 antepetalous ones resupinate (0.8-)1.2-2 mm, of 2 short ones 0.6-1.5 mm, the 5 antepetalous dehiscent by widely gaping, sometimes confluent slits; ovary conspicuously stipitate, the stipe 7-11 mm pilose with subhorizontal hairs, the body falcately incurved white- pilosulous with ascending hairs, the style very short, the minute stigmatic cavity looking up- and inward; ovules 74-98.

Pod pendulous, slow to mature and sometimes persistent into anthesis of the following year, massively linear-oblong, when fully fertile 40-60 x 3.6-5 cm, a little laterally compressed but strongly turgid, keeled dorsally by 1 and ventrally by 2 parallel blunt ribs, the former 7-14, the latter together 13-25 mm wide, the valves at first shining green becoming rough blackish transversely cracked and coarsely prominently venulose, consisting of a coriaceous exocarp 0.7-1.3 and a woody endocarp 1.2-2.5 mm thick, the cavity divided by stiffly chartaceous septa into one row of locules 7-8 mm long, these filled with sweetish (edible, cathartic) pulp that dries to laminated flakes adherent to the locule-walls; seeds turned broadside to the septa, obovoid-ellipsoid biconvex ±14-16 x 9-10 mm, the testa smooth lustrous castaneous; pod indehiscent, the seeds released only by weathering on the ground.—Collections: 110.—Fig. 1 (androecium), 2 (pod).

An element of lowland and riparian, semideciduous forest adapted to a more or less pronounced dry season, persisting in thickets and as a fence or shade tree, planted, apparently from remote times, about dwellings and thence sparingly naturalized, the aboriginal dispersal consequently ambiguous or controversial, but apparently truly native, mostly between 3 and 300 m but ascending in Nicaragua to 600 and in Colombia to 1000 m, in Central and South America and parts of the Greater Antilles: s.-e. Mexico (Tabasco) and s.e., predominantly on the drier Pacific slope, to the Magdalena and Cauca valleys in Colombia; middle Orinoco basin in Venezuela; e. and e.-centr. Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola and s.-w. Puerto Rico; along rivers and estuaries in the Guianas and lower Amazon (Para, reported by Ducke from Amazonas); disjunct in gallery forest of the Pantanal in Mato Grosso, Brazil; questionably native in s.-centr. Mexico (Guerrero, s.-w. Mexico), in trans-Andine Peru (middle Ucayali valley in Loreto) and at scattered points around the e. shoulder of Brazil; cultivated in Brazil s.-ward from Bahia, in tropical and subtropical gardens around the world, in some Lesser Antilles, and sometimes as an ornamental within its native range.—Fl. mostly (XI-)II-IV(-V), in the Guianas, the Amazon delta region and the Pantanal mostly VIII-X, the fls usually contemporary with the flush of new foliage, when the tree is partly defoliate.—Horse cassia, pink shower, liquorice tree; stinking-toe (B. W. I.); canafistula de Castilla (Mexico); carao, caragua (Centr. Amer.); bucut, mucut (Maya); caramano (Nicaragua); sandal (Costa Rica); cahandonga, capote (Colombia); canaflote, canafistolo buerrero (Venezuela); canafistula cimarrona (Pto. Rico); geneuna; marimari grande, m. preto (Brazil).