308 RHIZOPIIORACEAE. 



rowed at the base, shining above, the petioles 5-12 mm. long.; panicles as long 

 as the leaves or longer, pubescent, many-flowered, the flowers sessile or nearly 

 so, about 3 mm. broad; fruit subglobose or oval, 5-7 mm. in diameter. 



Coppices and scrub-lands, Andros, Great Exuma. Eleuthera, Cat Island, Wat- 

 ling"s, Acklin's, Crooked Island and Mariguana : Florida ; Cuba to St. Croix and 

 Guadeloupe; Jamaica; Cayman Islands. Sfpicm-WOOD. White Stopper. 



Family 5. RHIZOPHORACEAE Lindl. 



Mangrove Family. 



Shrubs or trees, with terete branches and usually glabrous foliage. 

 Leaves usually opposite, leathery, with stipules. Flowers perfect, solitary 

 in the axils or in spikes, racemes, cymes or panicles. Calyx with 3 or 4 

 valvate sepals. Petals as many as the sepals, 2-cleft or lacerate. Stamens 

 twice or four times as many as the petals, or rarely of the same number, 

 inserted at the base of a disk; filaments short or elongated; anthers 2- 

 celled, opening lengthwise. Ovary inferior, or partly inferior, usually 

 3-5-celled or rarely 1-celled; styles united; stigmas sometimes lobed. 

 Ovules 2 or rarely 4 or more in each cavity, pendulous. Fruit leathery, 

 crowned with the calyx, indehiscent or tardily septicidal. The family con- 

 sists of about 15 genera, containing some 50 species, natives of tropical 

 and subtropical regions. 



1. RHIZOPHORA L. Sp. PI. 443. 1753. 



Evergreen trees, with an astringent bark, and stout pithy twigs. Leaves 

 opposite, entire; stipules elongated, interpetiolar, caducous. Flowers cream- 

 colored or yellow, 2 or several on forking peduncles. Calyx-tube short, adnate 

 to the base of the ovary, the 4 lobes leathery. Petals 4, emarginate, leathery. 

 Stamens 4-12, alternate, with the petals; filaments short. Ovary 2-celled, half- 

 inferior, produced into a fleshy cone. Stigma 2-lobed. Ovules 2 in each 

 cavity. Fruit pendulous, 1-eelled, leathery. Seed solitary, germinating in the 

 persistent fruit, the elongating radicle sometimes reaching the ground before 

 the fruit falls. Endosperm wanting. [Greek, root-bearing.] Three known 

 species, the following typical, the others natives of the Old World tropics. 



1. Rhizophora Mangle L. Sp. PI. 443. 1753. 



A shrub or tree, reaching a height of 10 m. or more, forming impenetrable 

 thickets by the greatly elongating radicles of the embryo and the numerous 

 roots. Leaves 5-15 cm. long, leathery, elliptic or elliptic-obovate, obtuse, with 

 a stout midrib; petioles 0.5-1.5 cm. in length; peduncles 1-4 cm. long, 2-3- 

 flowered; pedicels stout, 5-10 mm. long; braetlets scale-like; calyx-tube fleshy, 

 turbinate or campanulate the lobes 3-5 mm. long; sepals lanceolate, about 

 1 em. long, involute, keeled within, very firm, recurved at maturity; petals 

 pale yellow, linear or nearly so, cleft at the tip, involute above the middle, 

 cobwebby along the edges; anthers clustered around the style; fruit 2-3 cm. 

 long, curved, the radicle protruding as a narrowly clavate pendent body. 



Maritime shores and salinas. throughout the archipelago : Bermuda : Florida ; 

 West Indies ; Mexico to Brazil ; west coast of Africa ; Pacific islands. Mangrove. 

 Catesby, 2 : pi. 63. 



