348 BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 
and so likewise at other times a perfect stamen occupies the place of 
the petal: on that account it may, perhaps, be better to consider this 
accessory organ as a staminode or abortive stamen. In the Senegam- 
bian plant it is thinner and more developed and petaloidal than it ever 
becomes in ours. In D. Guineense I never met with four stamens, as 
in ofr species, nor has it ever two ovaria, which occur not very spar- 
ingly in the Cape de Verd plant. I have not been able to examine 
flowers of D. discolor, Hook. fil. Fl. Nigr. p. 329; but as Mr. Bentham 
describes them as containing two petals instead of one, and the sta- 
mens as very short, I am unable to refer the present plant to that species. 
. Our plant is probably a tree throwing out lateral panicles from its 
axille after equinoctial raius, before the development of the leaves, 
as none have been sent. : 
: (To be continued.) 
BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 
Note on STILBACEE ; dy Dn. BENJAMIN CLARKE. 
Cuaracter.—Shrubs, having strictly the habit of Hricacee and 
Epacridee, with exstipulate leaves, from three to six in a whorl, but 
showing sometimes a tendency to become alternate. Flowers in dense 
spikes, each with three bracts at its base; frequently polygamous. 
Sepals from two to five, distinct and imbricated, or united into a tube. 
Corolla monopetalous, its orifice, and occasionally the dimb, densely 
hairy: the limb 5-parted, rarely 4-parted. (Female flowers apetalous?) 
Stamens four, inserted between the lobes of the corolla, the posterior 
stamen being abortive or rudimentary.  4nthers oblong or kidney- 
shaped. Ovary superior, 2-celled, or l-celled from retraction of the 
dissepiment ; the two cells thus merging into one. The cells equal or 
unequal ; the larger cell posterior, rarely anterior. Each cell with one 
erect anatropal ovule, when the cells are of equal size; the smaller cell 
frequently empty. ‘StyZe long and filiform. Stigma bifid. Fruit de- 
hiscent or indehiscent ; the dehiscence being septicidal, and the valves 
completely separating from each other, and again splitting at the 
back to a distance of about one-third of their length from the apex ; 
