DR. G. KING ON THE GENUS FICUS. 31 
of flask, on the inner surface of the walls of which a number of 
flowers are arranged. As the bottom of the interior of the flask 
corresponds to the apex of the axis, the flowers developed there 
are the oldest, while those developed nearest the mouth (the 
organic base) are the youngest. These flower-bearing axes are 
called figs, receptacles, or amphantha. They vary in colour, form, 
size, and in the situation which they occupy on the plant. In 
some species of the section Urostigma the receptacles while 
young are enclosed in calyptriform involucres, which are thrown 
off at an early stage of the expansion of the receptacles. These 
hood-like bodies persist longer in F. altissima than in any other 
species, but on the whole they are too fugacious to found specifie 
characters upon. The hollow receptacle has walls of more or less 
fleshy texture, and its mouth is occupied by rows of bracts, which 
in the majority of cases so interlock as practically to close it. 
The lower of these bracts often bend downwards into the cavity 
of the receptacle, curving round the upper flowers; the middle 
bracts are more or less horizontal in direction, while those to- 
wards the upper or outer part of the mouth project therefrom, so 
as to be visible externally and to form a more or less prominent 
apical umbilicus. In a few species the mouth is surrounded 
externally by a more or less clearly defined annulus, formed of 
-coalesced bracts. In shape the receptacle varies from spheroidal 
to ovoid, ellipsoid, obovoid, or pyriform. ‘In most species in- 
volucral bracts are found at the base of it; these bracts are 
usually three in number, and are generally distinct from each 
other, but sometimes they are slightly united, so as to form a 
kind of involucral cup. The receptacle in many species is con- 
tracted at its base, and in some this contraction is carried to such 
an extent that a kind of false stalk is formed. This stalk-like 
contraction must not, however, be confounded with the peduncle 
proper, by which, in many species, the receptacle is attached to 
the axis; and, as a fact, the stalk may invariably be distinguished 
from the peduncle proper by the position of the involucres just 
referred to, which are attached at the apex of the peduncle 
proper, but at the base of the pseudo-stalk. As regards situation, 
receptacles may occur in pairs in the axils of the leaves (e. g. 
Urostigma), or they may be solitary in the same situation from 
the abortion of one of the original pair (e. g. Synecia); they 
may also occur in axillary fascicles of three or more. In a large 
number of species (e. g. Neomorphe) the receptacles are borne 
