and on a new Genus of the Family Balanophoreze. 97 
much ramified in the circumference, but they do not, I think, pass into the 
receptacles or into any of the pistilla. 
The scales have no cuticle or internal cavities, they never present green 
colouring matter, and are generally colourless and blackened about their 
points. They are of a fleshy substance, and are provided with several simple 
vascular fascicles. y 
The bractez, which are only developed in the male spikes, are fleshy, 
abruptly truncate, and more or less canaliculate. In the species in which 
they are most so, owing to their lateral edges being partly at least in appo- 
sition, the flowers appear enclosed in alveoli; and this is particularly evident 
after the fall of the flowers, when the head of the spike presents a honey- 
combed appearance. Bal. dioica, as represented in the figure cited *, would 
appear to have cyathiform or involucelliform bractez; this probably is a 
mistake. The vascular bundles are obsolete, appearing rather as streaks of 
discoloured tissue; in them I have only observed fibres similar to those sur- 
rounding the vessels in the longitudinal bundles of the axis. 
The perianthium, which exists only in the male, is composed of 4 or 5 
sepals; if 5, the fifth is anticous ; their zestivation is valvate, their substance 
fleshy. I have not detected in them any vascular fascicles, although there is 
some appearance of their existence within each margin. 
The stamina are completely monadelphous, and, except in Bal. polyandra, 
are equal in number and opposite to the segments of the perianthium. From 
having observed certain irregular appearances in the anthers of Bal. alveolata 
(see Tan. V. fig. 8.), I think that the type of the anthers of Bal. prete 
may still be reduced to that of the other species. The centre of the antherifo- 
rous part of the column has presented one or two large patches of discoloured 
tissue. The anthers are very large, consisting of two large cells folded lon- 
gitudinally into the shape of a horseshoe ; they have no endothecal special 
apparatus; they open longitudinally; their number and structure are best 
ascertained before dehiscence. The pollen presents nothing peculiar. - 
The female stems are, so far as regards scales, &e., like those of the male, 
but they present no bractez, although round the base of the head there 
appears a tendency in some to their development. 
* Royle's Illustrations, t. 99, or 78a. 
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