FABACEE, the bean tribe, leguminous plants, of which about 300 known species belong to New Holland and Polynesia, 42 to Japan and China, 12 to Timor 14 to Persia, 20 to Arabia, and 891 species in the E. Indies and Java, arranged under 133 genera. It comprises 362 genera, and between 3000 and 4000 species, and most of them furnish products useful to man. Peas, beans, clover, saintfoin, lucerne, liquorice, indigo, medicks, and trefoilS, lupines, and numerous other common European genera belong to the section Curvem brim. Many species yield tonics and astringents, others yield a kind of gum, and- in a very large number of species, narcotic properties have been discovered. A cassia furnishes the senna leaves of the shops to this also belong the tamarind and algaroba 'fruits, the trees yielding logwood, Brazil-wood, sappan-wood, etc., and hymenma, from which gum-anime is procured. Some of them yield dyes. The locust trees of North America, belong to this order, and are celebrated for their gigantic stature. Gum arabic, senegal, sassa, and others are produced qoy. different species. Catechu is the extract of the astringent bark of Acacia catechu ; and one of the timbers known in England as rosewood, is said to be the wood of some Mimosa inhabiting the interior of Brazil. One of the roost striking phenomena
among the plants of this order is the excessive initability observable in the leaves of certain species of mimosie, such as M. pudica, M. sensitiva, which are hence called sensitive plants. It is, however, a special peculiarity, and not one of general occurrence,—unless the folding up at night of the leaves of the whole sub-order be regarded as an instance of the same irritable quality in a low degree. Of this fatuily the following are valuable timber trees,—Acacia stipulata, a valuable wood for general purposes ; Cassia fistula, a beautiful ornamental tree, yields a wood useful for furniture, naves and spokes of wheels, and tool handles ; Inga xylocarpa has a dense wood, resembling Cassia° fistula, used for windlaSses, block sheaves, and for parts of gun carriages, but too brittle to resist concussion.— Major Benson ; Voigt.