Anneslea. polyandria monogynia. 575 



as the partitions become obliterated in the ripe state. 

 Integuments, or bark, fleshy, armed with straight, sharp 

 spines not opening into any number of valves, but, as in 

 Nymphaea putrifying or crumbling away. Seeds nuciform, 

 about twenty, nearly round, each enveloped in a complete, 

 fleshy rose-coloured aril. Integuments two, the exterior one 

 or shell nuciform, dark brown, uneven, with a very conspi- 

 cuous pit near the oblong umbilicus which covers the vitel- 

 lus ; the inner one thin, and light brown. Perisperm con- 

 form to the seed, of a pure white, amygdaline consistence. 

 Vitellus lenticular, penetrating the perisperm about one 

 fourth its diameter, enveloped in its proper thin white in- 

 tegument, which adheres more firmly to the perisperm than 

 to this organ. Embryo lodged in the exterior half of the 

 vitellus, and attached to its exterior, elevated point, or 

 dome, oval, with the inner end divided into two equal 

 lobes. The part between these lobes and the apex, or 

 exterior end, which is united to the point of the vitellus, I 

 call the peduncle of the embryo, which lengthens as germi- 

 nation proceeds, and first forces the exterior end, or dome 

 of the vitellus, through the pit in the shell, already menti- 

 oned, and there taking a square from, the corners thereof 

 become ragged and blackish. The sheath or thickened 

 integument of the vitellus, which connects this part, 

 lengthens also, and opens in one side to give passage to 

 the two lobes of the embryo ; the peduncle continues 

 lengthening, and when from half an inch to an inch in 

 length, the two lobes, now evidently the two cotyledons, 

 begin to separate. The exterior one, and yet the largest, 

 takes a simple subulate shape ; and the inner, or smaller 

 lobe now advances fast, soon becoming not only the larg- 

 est, but long-peduncled, and trifid; from the bosom of 

 these the plumula advances, and from the base of the 

 petioles of the leaves thereof, and that of the trifid co- 

 tyledon the real roots issue, and give sustenance to the 

 little, now independent plant. 



