XXXVIII. SAPIXDACE.^. . 455 



SCHMIDELIA 



Flowers polygamous. Sepals 4, broadly imbricate, tlic enter ones smaller. 

 Petals 4, small, or rarely none. Disk one-sided, usually lobed or divided 

 into 4 glands. Stamens 8, more or less one-sided. Ovary excentrical, 2 or 

 rarely 3-celled ; style 2- or 3-lobed ; ovules solitary in each cell. Fruit of 1 

 orr.nrely 2 small ovoid or globidar indehiscent, fleshy or almost dry berries, 

 oeeds with a short arilhis; embryo curved, cotyledons folded. — Shrubs or 

 trees. Leaves with 1 or 3 leaflets. Flowers very small, iu simple or loosely 

 paniculate axillary racemes. 



^ The species are numerous in tropical America, with several African ones, and a few in tro- 

 pical Asia and the Indiaa Archipelago, one of the common Asiatic ones extending to Aus- 

 tralia.^ The genus is ouc of the most easily recognized in the Order, Ly its foliage as well 

 as by its small flowers and fruits. 



!• S. serrata, DQ, Prod, i. 610. A tree, the young leaves and shoots 

 pubescent-tomentose, often glabrous Avhcu full-grown. Leaflets 3, ovate or 

 obovate-obloug, obtuse or slightly acuminate, 3 to 4 iu. long, irregularly and 

 coarsely toothed, or rarely quite entire, sessile or narrowed into a short pctioluie, 

 glabrous above, pale or pubescent underneath, often bearing hairy tufts iu the 

 ^xiJs of the principal veins. Eacemcs slender, simple or sliglitly branched. 

 iMOAvers ^ to nearly 1 line diameter, on short pedicels, clustered along the 

 pubescent rhachis. Petals cuueate, wnth a minute scale. Disk of 4 snuall 

 ^bcs or glands. Stamens glabrous, Bemes small, globular. — W. and Arn. 

 I rod, 110 ; Ornitroplie serrata, lloxb. PL Corom. i. 44, t. Gl ; >S. (imorieusls, 

 DC, Dene. Herb. Timor. 115. 



w. Australia. N. coast, i2. Brown ; Port Essington, Armsiroag. The latter spcci- 

 P^t'ns are nearly glabrous, with the leaflets more sessile and narrowed at the base, as described 

 111 o. timor'tcdsh. Some of R. Browu's are similar; otlicrs arc more pubescent, Hke the 

 comniou form in India, where these charantors arc very variable; and, as suggested by 

 ".and Arn., these plants may all be varieties only of -S. Cohhe^ViMXi,, which would thus have 

 a very wide range over tropical Asia^ including the Arcliipclago, 



5. DIPLOPELTIS, Endl. 



Flowers polygamous. Sepals 5, persistent, imbricate iu the bud. Petals 

 4, the place of the fifth vacant, clawetb without any scale inside. Disk very 

 oblique, produced into a concave or apparently double scale. Stamens 8, 

 ^vithin the disk, tnrncdtoone side. Ovary 2- or 3-lobed, 2- or 3-ccllcd ; style 

 ftscending'^ usually twisted ; ovules 2 in each cell, supei-posed halfway up the 

 inner angles. Capsule 2- or 3-celled, opening loculicidally in as many valves, 

 or separating into cocci. Seeds usually solitary in each carpel; testa cnist- 

 ^ceous ; arillus small ; embryo spirally rolled. — Shrubs or undcrshrubs, more 

 or less glandular-pubescent. Leaves alternate, entire or pinnatifid. Panicles 

 terminal, with scorpioid racemes. Flowers white pink or violet, larger than 

 in most Sapindacece, 



The genu3 is limited io Australia. 



■Fi'ait separating into distiuct indehiscent cocci. 



leaves ovate or obovate, on distinct, rather long petioles .... 1. D. pdiolaris. 

 Leaves linear, oblonj, cuncate, or pinnatifid, narrowed into very short 



petioles or sessile" 2. jD. Ilue^/elii, 



