748 DIOECIA MONANDRU. CyCUS. 



plant. Female. The spatlices are numerous, and with ge- 

 nerally three pistils on each side, beyond these tliey rise 

 in a curve, and immediately expand into an ovate-triangu- 

 lar shape, with long-, subulate points, and the whole margins 

 deeply and acutely dentate ; every part, except the pistil, is 

 clothed with a thick coat of ferruginous down, which is easi- 

 ly rubbed off. In C. circinalis these form a large globular 

 crown in the centre of the last year's foliage, and are surround- 

 ed with numerous, barren, cuspidate scales, or bractes. Germs 

 solitary, round, partly immersed in the edge of the spadix, 

 one-celled, ovula solitary, amply attached to the bottom of 

 the cell. Style short, straight. Siiynm simple, perforated. 

 Drupes nearly round, a little compressed, smooth, about the 

 size of a pigeon's egg, tipped with the permanent stigma, when 

 ripe of a dull orange colour. Pulp somewhat mealy, sweet, 

 yellow, but the smell is uncommonly disagreeable. Nut so- 

 litary, conform to the drupes, ligneous, a little pointed under 

 the stigma, with a small elevation running from thence to the 

 base on each side, which marks the place where it bursts, when 

 the seeds begins to vegetate, consequently it is two-valved. 

 Seeds\ng\e, of the size and shape of the cavity of the nut which 

 it completely fills. Integuments three, the exterior one deep 

 brown, thick, and firm, adhering to the inside of the shell, 

 particularly at the bottom, the middle one thin, of a light 

 brown, membranaceous, and the inner one a very thin white 

 membrane. Perisperni conform to the seed, of a pale yel- 

 lowish white, fleshy; in its apex, under the style, is a trans- 

 versely oval pit, the bottom thereof marked with five or six 

 brown dots, corresponding with as many oblong cavities im- 

 mediately under them, which penetrate, in unimpregnated 

 seeds about one-tenth their diameter, these are alike in shape 

 and size, but in such as have been impregnated, one of these 

 cells penetrates more than half way down, through its centre, 

 and contains a wedge-shaped body, which I call the vitellus^ 

 suspended, or attached to the mouth of the cell, by a long, 

 white, folded, umbilical cord. A vertical section of this body 



