46 MR. J. MIERS ON THE FAMILY OF TRIURIACE^. 



From these facts we may safely conclude, that neither the Aphylleia of Champion, nor 

 Cuming's specimen from the Indian Archipelago, nor Pur die's from Venezuela, differ gene- 

 rically from the Sciaphila tenella of Blume, a very similar plant from Java, long before 

 described in the ' Bijdragen ' of that celebrated botanist. 



Being compelled to impugn the accuracy of the observations of others, it is essential 

 that I should detail minutely those facts which alone can guide us to a knowledge of the 

 true affinities of these singular plants, and I therefore proceed to describe the structure of 

 the seed, as I have found it in Sciaphila. Captain Champion, in the memoir above quoted, 

 figures and describes the embryo as a comparatively large body lying across, and near the 

 vertex of the albumen, with a pointed radicle as long as the cotyledonary portion ; but the 

 whole seed, he says, " is so minute, and difficult of dissection, that it is hard to say whether 

 the cotyledons are one or two;" the radicle, he adds, "is slightly curved, and pointed 

 towards the hilum ; the albumen, which is originally liquid, becomes hard as the seed 

 ripens, and usually causes the testa to burst on the side opposite the raphe." Gardner 

 adds, " The radicle is short, conical, and of a brownish colour ; the cotyledons elliptical, 

 compressed, and white ;" the embryo lies " on the outside of a t\xm fleshy albumen, or but 

 slightly covered with it, on the side of the seed opposite the raphe, nearly straight, and 

 with the radicle directed towards the hilum," which he states to be on the dorsal face of 

 the seed. The albumen, which according to Gardner is " fleshy," is said by Champion to 

 be somewhat " corneous " in Hyalisma, and " rather hard " in Sciaphila. It is remarkable 

 that such circumstantial details are not only inconsistent with each other, but decidedly at 

 variance with the structure of the seed, as I have observed it. 



My observations upon the seed of Sciaphila are to the following effect. The outer coat 

 is a distinct utricle, composed of cellular tissue with intervening merenchyma, the inner 

 face being marked with muriform lines, the outer surface formed of large, prominent, sub- 

 spherical and somewhat overlying vesicles. This bursts along the whole dorsal side, the 

 apex and part of the ventral face, by a gaping line, displaying an entirely free, erect, 

 obovoid body, connected only by its conical support with the base of the utricle. This 

 body, in the dried state, is marked by several (about eight) prominent, dark-coloured, 

 longitudinal ribsj with intervening hollow spaces, which are pellicular and transparent, 

 the ribs being connected with transverse dark bars, and the membranous intervals marked 

 with spots of a dark crimson colour ; in the centre, the opake seed is readily distinguished. 

 This structure is rendered more apparent by making a transverse section of the whole, 

 when the seed appears as if enclosed within a second indehiscent utricle : the ribs all 

 spring from the conical support of the seed, and after running parallel are arched over, 

 and all again are united in a dark tumescent strophiole, which is attached to the apex of 

 the seed. This second envelope appears to partake somewhat of the nature of an arillus, 

 in which the longitudinal ribs convey the nourishing vessels, and from whose common 

 points of union the seed is both supported and suspended. The testa of the included oval 

 seed is of a deep crimson colour, marked by several longitudinal lines, with very numerous 

 transverse hexagonoid areolae, forming an almost scalariform structure ; it is hard, testa- 

 ceous, and lined within by a fine, transparent, reticulated, adhering membrane ; but not the 

 smallest trace of any nervure, or distinct raphe, on the surface of the testa, can be distin- 



