212 CXVIII. THYMELZACEEZ (PEARSON). 
Orver CXVIII. THYMELEACER. (By H. H. W. Pearson.) 
Flowers perigynous, regular, dichlamydeous or with the petals 
aborted, hermaphrodite or, by abortion, polygamous or dicecious. 
Calyx tubular, cylindric or square in section, usually somewhat swollen 
around the ovary; lobes 4 or 5, imbricate, spreading during flowering, 
equal or rarely with the 2 interior rather smaller. Petals equal to and 
alternating with the calyx-lobes, inserted on the throat of the tube or 
below the stamens, usually much smaller than the calyx-lobes, fre- 
quently 0. Stamens as many or twice as many as the calyx-lobes, 
inserted on the calyx-tube—if in two whorls those of the upper 
usually opposite to the calyx-lobes; filaments usually very short ; 
anthers 2-celled, introrse, dehiscing by parallel longitudinal slits. Disc 
hypogynous, annular, cup-shaped, lobed or 0. Ovary superior, 1- or 2- 
celled (4-celled in Octolepis), sessile or shortly stalked, entire. Style 
slender, short or long, excentric (1-celled ovary) or central (2-celled 
ovary); stigma terminal, capitate or subdiscoid. Ovule 1 in each cell, 
affixed laterally near the apex, anatropous, pendulous, with a ventral 
raphe. Fruit a nut, drupe, or pyrene (capsule in Octolepis), usually 
enclosed in the base of the calyx-tube. Albumen of the seed fleshy, 
copious, scanty or 0. Embryo straight; cotyledons fleshy, usually 
thick.—Trees or shrubs, very rarely slender annual herbs, with tough 
fibrous bark. Leaves opposite, alternate or scattered, entire, small 
ericoid or large, flat. Stipules 0. Flowers in involucrate heads, or 
in short racemes, spikes or fascicles, rarely solitary ; the heads or 
spikes at the apices of the branches or sessile (rarely pedunculate) in the 
leaf-axils. Bracts various, frequently few or absent. 
About 400 species: many in South Africa, the Mediterranean region and 
Australia; a few in Asia and North and South America. About 90 species in 
Tropical Africa. 
I have not followed Gilg in the reduction of the genera Arthrosolen and 
Lasiosiphon to Gnidia. Lasiosiphon is distinguished not only by its 5-merous 
flower, but also by other characters readily recognised in the field. Arthrosolen 
presents some difficulty. The only constant character which separates it from 
Gnidia is the absence of petals. These are very minute in some species of Gnidia, 
and, on this account as well as for other reasons, these genera must be regarded as 
closely allied. But several of the genera of the Thymeleacea, as of many other 
families, are necessarily separated by small and apparently artificial characters, and 
it is doubtful whether any useful purpose is served by attempting to raise the 
standard of generic differences at the cost of a further complication of synonymy. 
The material of Octolepis at Kew is too incomplete to allow of independent 
investigation, and I have therefore followed Oliver and Gilg in retaining it within 
this family, with which it undoubtedly possesses some degree of affinity. 
TRIBE I. Buthymeleece. Ovary 1-celled. Ovule solitary. Fruit a nut. 
Stamens as many as the calyx-lobes . ‘ . 1, STRUTHIOLA. 
Stamens twice as many as the calyx-lobes, inserted 
above the middle of the calyx-tube. 
Flowers in bracteate heads or spikes, rarely axillary. 
Petals 0 or shorter than the calyx-lobes, 
