236 



double longitudinal placentae, which often cobere, so as to give the appearance of two cells. 

 Seeds very numerous, minute, suspended, naked, or with a coma ; albumen none ; embryo 

 straight, taper, orthotropous. — Terrestrial or parasitical plants, usually herbaceous and 

 stemless, occasionally caulescent, and sometimes shrubby. Leaves usually opposite, one 

 of them being dwarfed, radical, crenate and rugose, or smooth. Flowers umbellate, often 

 purple or pink. 



Affinities. Very closely allied to Gesnereae, Bignoniaceae, and Peda- 

 lineae. From the former they differ in nothing except their never having any 

 tendency to produce an inferior ovarium, their deeply-lobed placentae, their 

 usually siliquose fruit, and the want of albumen ; agreeing entirely with them 

 in habit. From Bignoniaceae they are distinguished by their herbaceous 

 mode of growth, their minute apterous seeds, 1 -celled ovarium, with 2 double 

 parietal placentae. From Pedalineae they differ in nothing whatever, except 

 their minute indefinite seeds, and the membranous, not woody, texture of the 

 fruit and placentae. Sesamum forms a transition from the one order to the 

 other, which would, perhaps, be better combined. Mr. Don appears to me to 

 have been mistaken in assigning an heterotropous embryo to this tribe ; the 

 embryo is certainly orthotropous in Streptocarpus Rexii, with which the other 

 genera no doubt agree. Von Martius refers Ramonda hither. 



Geography. They occupy nearly the same station in the Old World 

 as Gesnereae in the New, being almost entirely confined to the tropics, unless 

 the Ramonda of the Pyrenees should be found a genuine plant of the order, 

 as Von Martius supposes. 



Properties. Unknown. 



Examples. Cyrtandra, Didymocarpus, Chirita, Incarvillea. 



CCXVII. BIGNONIACEtE. The Trumpet-Flower Tribe. 



BiGKONi^, § 2.Juss. Gen. 13?. (1789) — Bignoniack^, R.Brown Prodr. 4/0. (1810); 

 Link Handb. 1. 503. (1829) a sect, o/ Personata;. 



Diagnosis. Monopetalous dicotyledons, with a superior 2-celled cap- 

 sule, a central placenta, irregular unsymmetrical flowers, and exalbuminous 

 winged seeds. 



Anomalies. Eccremocarpus has a 1-celled fruit with parietal placentae. 

 The fruit is sometimes spuriously 4-celled. 



Essential Character. — Calyx divided or entire, sometimes spathaceous. Corolla 

 monopetalous, hypogjTious, usually irregular, 4-5-lobed. Stamens 5, unequal, always 1, 

 sometimes 3, sterile; anthers 2-celled, formed normally. Ovarium seated in a disk, 2- 

 celled, or spuriously 4-celled, polyspermous ; sit/le 1 ; stiyma of 2 plates. Capsule 2-valved, 

 2-celled, often long and compressed, sometimes spuriously 4-celled. Dissepiment either 

 parallel with tbe valves, or contrary to them, finally becoming separate, bearing the seeds 

 at the commissure along with the valves. Seeds transverse, comjiressed, often winged ; 



aUmmen 0; embryo straight, foliaceous ; radicle centrifugal Trees or shrubs, often 



twining or climbing. Leaves opposite, very rarely alternate, compound or occasionally 

 simple, without stipulae. Inflorescence terminal, somewhat panicled. 



Affinities. Distinguished from Scrophularineae and their immediate 

 allies by the want of albumen, from Acanthacetc by their winged seeds, and 

 from both by their arborescent habit. Eccremocarpus is, however, an excep- 

 tion to the latter character, and also differs in having an unilocular ovarium 

 and fruit; in the latter respect approaching Cyrtandracc.u and Pedalineae, 

 from which, however, its winged seeds divide it. This wing to the seed is. 

 a beautiful membrane formed of transparent cellular tissue, which, in an 

 Indian unpublished genus given me by Dr. Wallich, offers an instance of 



