TAMARIND

(Arab, tam or-hlndy, Indian date.) A tree of the Leguminous order, whose pods supply the id preserve commonly sold in the shops under this name. The pods in their natural st; te are acid, and acquire their sweetne by the sugar in which they are packed alter their hard, brittle shell has been taken off. The tree itself is a native of both the East and West Indies. TA'.MARIX (Tamaris i a, the people among whom it grows), is a name given by botanists to some shrubs of ■lender growth, clothed with very small green leaves and long spikes of pink flowers, the natural country of which as to extend from Spain to Delhi, occupying a band of ten or twelve degrees CI latitude. They are in this country merely ornamental plants; but in Syria and the adjoining countries they secrete a kind of manna, which some authors have a erted was the manna of scripture; but this opinion is not regarded as well founded. TAMBOUKl' NE. (Fr. tambour.) A musical instrument of proce ion of the drum species, being a cylinder of aboutO inches wide, in which bells are suspended. It is covered at one end with parchment, after the fashion of a drum. [s. 1229]