In my paper I took notice, that one of the best kinds of varnish was collected from the Anacardium in Japan; and recommended it to the inhabitants of the British islands in America, to make trial of the occidental Anacardium, or Cashew-nut tree, which abounds in those islands. This has occasioned Mr. Ellis to take great pains to shew, that the eastern and western Anacardium were different trees: a fact, which was well known to every botanist before; and of which I could not be ignorant, having been possessed of both sorts near thirty years. But as I was assured, from many repeated experiments, that the milky juice, with which every part of the Cashew-tree abounds, would stain linen with as permanent a black as that of the oriental Anacardium; so I just hinted, that it was worth the trial. Nor was my hint grounded on those experiments only, but on the informations I had received from persons of the best credit, who had resided long in the American islands, that people are very careful to keep their linen at a distance from those trees, well knowing, that if a drop of the juice fell upon it, they could never wash out the stain. But Mr. Ellis, in order to prove that this tree has no such quality of staining, says, he has made some experiments on the caustic oil, with which the shell or cover of the Cashew-nut abounds; and that he found it was not endued with any staining quality. But surely those experiments cannot be mentioned to prove, that the milky juice of the tree has not this property: and Sir Hans Sloane, in his History of Jamaica, says, that the inhabitants of Jamaica stain their cottons with the bark of the Cashew-tree. I shall not intrude farther on the patience of the gentlemen, who may be present when this paper is read; but humbly crave their pardon for detaining them so long: nor should I have given them this trouble, had not I thought my reputation concerned on the occasion. LVI. _An Answer to the preceding Remarks. By Mr._ John Ellis, _F.R.S._ [Read Jan. 19, 1758.] MY letter to Mr. Webb, which is printed in the second part of the xlixth volume of the Philosophical Transactions[209], was intended to shew this Honourable Society, that Mr. Miller, in his reply to the Abbé Mazeas’s letter, had brought no proofs to lessen the discovery, which he tells us the Abbé Sauvages had made, in attempting to improve the art of painting or staining linens and cottons of a fine durable black colour, by making use of the juice of the Carolina pennated Toxicodendron, instead of the common method of staining black with gauls and a preparation of iron; which, he says, always turns to a rusty colour when washed.