290 



FLORA OK JAMAICA 



na/rdia 



10. BERNARDIA Ad ins. 



Shrul.> (or herbs) with stellate or simple hairs. Leaves 

 alternate, dentate. Flowers mona-cious or dioecious, without 

 petals, in axillary spikes. Spikes sometimes very short, of both 

 male and female flowers densely crowded with overlapping 

 bracts. Male flowers usually minute, the female sometimes with 

 a few bracts. Petals none. Disk none, or of separate glands. 

 Male flowers : Calyx in the bud globose and closed, valvately 

 3-4-parted in flowering. Stamens indefinite (3-25) ; filaments 



D 



Fig. 94. Bemardia carpinifolia Griseb. 



A, Portion of branch with leaves 

 B - 3 and male inflorescence in bud 



X 3. 



B, Male flower x 9. 



C, Stamens x 11. 



D, Female flower X 7. 



E, Coccus with seed X 3. 



F, Seed X 3. 



free ; anthers, as it were, 4-celled crosswise, each cell being 

 2-globose. No rudiment of ovary. Female flowers : Sepals 6 

 (5-9), imbricate. Ovary 3-celled ; styles 3, cut into numerous 

 thread-like segments (in Jamaican species) ; ovules solitary. 

 Capsule splitting up into three 2-valved cocci. Seeds subglobose, 

 without a caruncle. 



Species nearly 40, natives of tropical and subtropical America. 



B. earpinifolia Griseb. FL Br. W. Ind. 45 (1859). B. fruti- 

 cosa foliis tomentosis &c. Browne Hist. Jam. 361. B. dichotoma 



