150 CAPPABIDACEAE. 



2-6 cm. long, oval to obovate, acute or short-acuminate, serrulate ; racemes 1-4 

 dm. long; bracts suborbicular, oval or broadly obovate; sepals lanceolate, 4-5 

 mm. long, acuminate; petals white or pink, 5-10 mm. long; blades suborbicular, 

 longer than the claws; stamens 6; capsules linear, 4-6 cm. long, surpassing the 

 glandular pedicel in length; seeds 1-5 mm. broad, coarsely rugose and muricate. 



Waste and cultivated lands, New Providence at Grant's Town : Bermuda ; 

 southern United States ; West Indies and tropical continental America. Native of 

 the Old World tropics. Small Spider-flowek. 



2. CAPPARIS L. Sp. PI. 503. 1753. 



Trees or shrubs, with simple, mostly coriaceous leaves, sometimes stipu- 

 late on young or barren shoots, and large corymbose, mostly white flowers. 

 Sepals 4, distinct or partly united, often with a gland at the base. Petals 4, 

 distinct, imbricated. Stamens several or usually many, the filaments filiform, 

 the anthers short. Ovary stalked, 1-4-celled; ovules few or many, usually on 2 

 parietal placentae; style none; stigma depressed. Fruit elongated-linear, or 

 oblong, or short and subglobose, indehiscent, or irregularly rupturing. Seeds 

 without endosperm; embryo convolute; cotyledons fleshy. [From the Greek 

 name of the Caper-tree, Capparis spinosa L., of Europe.] About 150 species, 

 natives of tropical and subtropical regions. Type species: Capparis spinosa L. 



Leaves densely scaly beneath. 1. C. cynophallophora. 



Leaves glabrous. 2. C. flcxuosa. 



1. Capparis cynophallophora L. Sp. PI. 504. 1753. 



Capparis jamaicensis Jacq. Enum. 23. 1760. 



A shrub or a tree up to about 15 m. high, with a trunk diameter reaching 

 2 or 3 dm., the bark brown, furrowed, the slender, angular twigs densely scaly. 

 Leaves elliptic or oblong, coriaceous, 4-12 cm. long, 2-6 cm. wide, or those 

 of shoots narrowly linear, sometimes 3 dm. long and only 5-10 mm. wide, acute 

 obtuse or emarginate at the apex, narrowed at the base, glabrous and shining 

 above, densely silvery-scaly and with the lateral venation obsolete beneath, the 

 scaly petioles 1-3 cm. long; corymbs few-several-flowered; pedicels stout, scaly, 

 0.5-3 cm. long; flowers fragrant; flower-bud 4-angled; sepals distinct, valvate, 

 8-12 mm. long, densely scaly, reflexed, nearly as long as the white petals; 

 stamens numerous, purplish, 2-3 times as long as the petals, the anthers yellow; 

 fruit narrowly linear, torulose, drooping, 8 cm.-4 dm. long, 6-8 mm. thick, 

 irregularly rupturing, scarcely fleshy, often much longer than the gynophore. 



Scrub-lands and thickets, Andros, Long Island, Cat Island, Watling's, Atwood 

 Cay, Acklin's, Fortune, Crooked, Mariguana, Caicos and Inagua : Florida ; Cuba to 

 Tortola and Barbadoes ; Jamaica. Black Willow. 



2. Capparis flexuosa L. Sp. PI. ed. 2, 722. 1762. 



Capparis cynophallophora L. Syst. ed. 10, 1071. 1759. 



A glabrous shrub, or a tree up to 8 m. high, with a trunk 2 dm. in diameter, 

 the bark brown, the branches slender, sometimes vine-like. Leaves elliptic to 

 oblong, lanceolate to linear, coriaceous, 4-9 cm. long, obtuse, emarginate or 

 sometimes acute at the apex, obtuse or narrowed at the base, reticulate-veined 

 on both sides, the rather stout petioles 2-6 mm. broad, with a small sessile, 

 oblong or subglobose gland in the axil; corymbs few-flowered; pedicels stout, 

 12 mm. long or less; flowers fragrant; sepals suborbicular, 5-8 mm. broad, 

 slightly united at the base, the outer a little smaller than the inner; petals 

 white to rose, obovate, 1.5-2 cm. long; stamens numerous, about 3 times as long 



