Sarcophyte.| CXXI, BALANOPHORE® (BOTTING HEMSLEY). 35 
Fruit compound, fleshy, with immersed coriaceous or crustaceous 
achenes, or the carpels themselves fleshy and crowded but not consoli- 
dated. Seed filling the cell, globose or oblong, albuminous; testa 
exceedingly thin. Embryo microscopic, central or lateral, undivided. 
—Herbs parasitic on the roots of trees and shrubs, dwarf, fleshy, 
perennial or flowering only once, destitute of chlorophyll, but usually 
brightly or brilliantly coloured. Caudex tuberous, irregularly lobed 
and bearing branched inflorescences, or emitting branched cylindrical 
rhizomes bearing unbranched inflorescences, Leaves reduced to scales, 
usually densely imbricated. Inflorescences usually emerging from a 
more or less distinct ring of scales termed a volva. 
About 15 genera and 50 species of this order have been described and they are 
widely, though not generally, distributed in tropical and subtropical regions. With 
regard to the delimitation of the genera of the Balanophorea, a critical examination 
of the accumulated material in herbaria would probably lead to some alterations. 
Vor example, apart from the presence or absence of a perianth in the female flowers, 
some of the species referred to Balanophora differ less from the species of one section 
of Thonningia than the species of the two sections of Thonningia differ from each 
other. But it would be rash to attempt a new classification of some of the genera 
without reference to the others. 
The nature of the parasitism of the African members, at least, of the Balanophoree 
is peenliar, and although it was mentioned by Sir Joseph Hooker in Lindley’s 
Vegetable Kingdom, ea. 3 (1853), 89, and more recently by others, including Prof. 
H. Lecomte, it is by no means a matter of general knowledge, and consequently 
deserves a few words of explanation here. Of the processes of germination and 
subsequent development little has been observed, but apparently the tissues of the 
parasite do not enter the system of the host; no sinkers being formed. The seed 
germinates on the surface of the roots of the host and developes a tuberous growth 
into which the host itself pushes new roots, which convey the nutriment required by 
the parasite. This phenomenon offers a field of interesting investigation. 
Tuber thick and irregularly-lobed, not emitting cylindrical 
rhizomes. Inflorescences much-branched. Stamens free, 
of the same number and opposite the perianth-lobes, in- 
cluded ; anthers globose, many-celled, dehiscing by pores. 
Stigma sessile, large, discoid : : . . - I. SaRcoPuYTe. 
Tuber emitting cylindrical branched rhizomes, bearing 
pedunculate, or sessile, involucrate heads of flowers. 
Stamens united in a column, exceeding the usually 
imperfect perianth; anthers linear, usually 2-celled, 
dehiscing longitudinally. Style long, capillary . . 2, THONNINGISt 
1, SARCOPHYTE, Sparrm. ; Benth. et Hook. f. Gen. Pl. 
iii. 254. 
Flowers fleshy, unisexual, diccious; inflorescence branched, scaly at 
the base only. Male flowers racemose-paniculate. Perianth 2-4-partite, 
mostly 3-partite ; lobes equal, valvate. Stamens free, of the same number 
and opposite the perianth-lobes ; anthers globose, many-celled, dehisc- 
Ing by pores; pollen globose. Female flowers capitate-paniculate, 
destitute of perianth, crowded, free from each other (connate in the 
lower part, Hichler). Ovary more or less immersed in the fleshy naked 
