Sapindacææ

Sapindacææ, a natural order of exogenous plants, consisting of trees and twining shrubs furnished with tendrils, very rarely herbaceous climbers. Their leaves are often marked with lines or pellucid dots. The order contains seventy genera and about 400 known species, natives of warm climates, especially of South America and India; none of them natives of Europe. The individuals of this natural order exhibit the most varied properties. Some produce delicious fruits, others are purely medicinal, some again abound in a saponaceous principle, while a few are dangerously poisonous, and still fewer yield wholesome food-products. The root of Cardiospermum halicacabum (Heart-seed) is diaphoretic, diuretic, and aperient, while in the Moluccas its leaves when cooked are eaten as a vegetable. The genus Serjana is poisonous; S. ternata (Supple Jack), a native of South America, is used to stupefy fish, and the long rambling stems from which it takes its popular name are cut into lengths for walking-sticks. The same poisonous principle resides in the genus Paullinia (see GUARANÁ); yet from the seeds of P. sorbilis Guarana bread is made. In the genus Schmidelia the same contradictory qualities are exhibited. The Soapberry (q.v.) is the fruit of Sapindus saponaria, the type of the order.