CONSPECTUS OF THE ORDERS. XV 
which, however, lead normally to the development of only one perfect embryo. 
Fruiting ‘‘ cones’ usually much enlarged, either with the seeds more or less covered 
by the indurated scales (or their appendages) or enclosed among the fused and fleshy 
scales, the fruit finally resembling a berry or drupe; or reduced to 1 or 2 (rarely 
more) exposed seeds borne on the dry or fleshy axis of the cone; fruiting ‘‘ florets ”’ 
nut- or drupe-like, according to the coriaceous or half-fleshy, half-bony structure of 
the mature envelope. Seeds, if wholly covered or enclosed, with a crustaceous to 
woody testa—if partly or wholly exposed, with an externally fleshy and internally 
woody testa or enveloped in a more or less fleshy aril. Embryo axile in the copious 
fleshy or oily, rarely starchy endosperm, straight ; cotyledons 2-«. Woody plants, 
mostly trees, sometimes with short, tuberous stems. Leaves mostly coriaceous, 
usually simple (often linear or much reduced and squamiform), or pinnate to bipinnate 
({Cycadales}. <‘ Cones” terminal or axillary, solitary or clustered (rarely spicate or 
paniculate), inconspicuous at the time of pollination or more or less vividly coloured ; 
‘*florets”” in spikes, Pollination mostly by wind; pollen deposited directly on the 
micropyle or nucellus. 
CLASS I—GNETALES, 
Diclinous, dicecious or moneecious. Male floret (pseudo-bisexual in Welwitschia) : 
envelope formed of one pair or two decussating pairs of scales, free or united ; 
stamens 1-8 with the anthers sessile or subsessile on the summit of a stout central 
axis or [ Welwitschia] 6 with the filaments connate at the base around a central 
superior barren ovule. Female floret : envelope an ovary-like utricle with the ovule 
naked, erect, orthotropous ; ovule with a single integument produced into an elongated 
tubular micropyle which protrudes through the orifice of the utricle and with or 
without an aril. Seed albuminous, enclosed at maturity in the hardened utricle 
which is either differentiated into a fleshy outer and a hard inner layer or entirely 
coriaceous and sometimes [ Welwitschia] produced laterally into 2 wings. Embryo 
straight with 2, rarely 3, cotyledons. Erect or scandent, virgate or leafy shrubs, 
trees or woody climbers or [ Welwitschia] a woody plant of unique form consisting of 
a stout tuberous hypocotyl and an early arrested depressed stem-apex, with true 
vessels in the secondary wood, without resin canals. Foliage-leaves two or more, 
rarely in whorls of 3, opposite, simple. Florets (flowers) few or many, in axillary, 
rarely terminal, unisexual or bisexual spikes; spikes at the time of pollination 
greenish or yellowish, rarely vividly coloured [ Welwitschia]. Seeds with their 
envelopes more or less enclosed in the dry or fleshy spikes or exposed and drupe-like 
[Gnetum]. 
CXXVITI. Gnuracza. Only order. 
CLASS II.—CONIFERALES. 
Diclinous (normally), moncecious or dicecious. Male cones (male strobiles: male 
flowers) mostly catkin-shaped, made up of verticillate or spirally arranged scales 
(stamens: microsporophylls), bearing dorsally, or rarely around the scale-stalk, 2-15 
pollen-sacs (microsporangia) ; pollen-saes dehiscing variously ; pollen-grains roundish, 
with or without vesicular appendages; generative cell producing 2 immotile male 
cells. Female cones (female strobiles: female flowers: female inflorescences) 
usually catkin-shaped, subsessile or pedancled, made up of verticillate or spirally 
