The leading tree that yields rosewood has been supposed to be Jacaranda mimosaefolia. The proceedings of the Botanical Society of Edinburg give the following as the latest information in regard to it:

" Brazilian Rosewood, which is the Rosewood par excellence, has been used in Europe for furniture purposes, for at least 200 years, and if the dates on some articles of this material, shown at South Kensington, be correct, for nearly 300 years. Tables and cabinets were made of it long before Mahogany was brought across the Atlantic. According to a Brazilian official publication Rosewood trees are abundant in all the provinces on the east side of the empire, from Pernambuco to Rio de Janeiro. The exports of this wood from Brazil have increased tenfold, within the last fifty or sixty years, and now amount in value to about £100,000 per annum. Notwithstanding its importance, and the length of time it has been used in Europe, the species of tree which yields it is not yet known. In Brazil it is called Jacaranda-wood; but in that country, there are several Jacarandas - the black, the purple, the violet, the white, and the thorny Jacarandas, the species of which are known, besides the rose Jacaranda, of which apparently only the genus is known.

At all events, the botanical source of Brazilian Rosewood is not known in Europe. According to the catalogue of the Kew Museum, it is supposed to be obtained from one or more species of Dalbergia. In East India there are three dark heavy woods belonging to this genus, well-known for their useful properties, which somewhat resemble, though they have not the beauty of Brazilian Rosewood. These are the Dalbergia latifolia, the D. sissoo, and the D. cultrata. Indeed, the D. latifolia has been long well-known in England as East India Rosewood.

" Rosewood being known to be distinctly resinous - a property which is well seen by lighting a splinter of it - a number of experiments were made to determine the amount and character of the resins and resinous coloring matters which Brazilian and Honduras Rosewood, as well as two species (Dalbergia latifolia and D. sissoo) of the Indian woods referred to, contained. The results of these experiments, which consisted in treating the sawdust of the different samples with naphtha, ether, and alcohol, showed that the character of the resinous matters extracted from these woods is nearly the same in all, and that there is no great difference in their quantity. For example, the naphtha extract was in most cases, about 1 1/2 per cent of the wood, the ether extract averaged nearly 4, and the spirit extract roundly 14 per cent. The total extract was rather higher in the Brazilian than in the East Indian woods. The naphtha extract has the characters of ordinary Pine resin - viz., ready solubility in spirit, and the highly characteristic odor when heated.

Both the ether and the alcohol extracts are very dark colored, and the latter especially has a very strong tinctorial power, one part in 100,000 of alcohol showing a distinct color in a test tube.

"The results of similar experiments with a few other woods were given. A specimen of ebony, curiously enough, scarcely colored the ether or the alcohol, but its naphtha extract was considerable. Spanish Mahogany gave extracts not far short in quantity to some of the Rosewoods, but there is difference in the characters of the former, most marked in their comparatively feeble tinctorial power. The other woods tried gave results entirely different from those obtained from the Mahogany, and still more with those got from the Rosewood experiments".