Menispermales.] 



MENISPERMACE^. 



307 



Order CIV. MENISPERMACE^.— Menispermads. 



Menispermeae, Juss. Gen. 284. (1789) 

 Wight and Ai-^wtt. Prodr. 1 



DC. Si/st. 1. 508.— Menispermaceae, DC. Prodr. 1. 95. (1824; 

 11 ; Endl. clxxii. ; Meisner, p. 5 ; Wight lllustr. 1. 19. 



Diagnosis. — Mcnis2Krmal Exogens, with ampMtropal seeds, and a large einhryo4n a 

 moderate quantity of solid albumen. 

 Shinibs, with a flexible tough tissue, and sarraentaceous habit ; their wood often with- 

 out zones. Leaves alternate, entire. Flowers small, usually racemose, and dioecious. 



MMw 



Fig. CCXII. 



$ Sepals and petals midis- 

 tinguishable, in several rows, 

 each of which is usually com- 

 posed of 3 (rarely of 2) or 4 

 parts, hypogynous, deciduous. 

 Stamens monadelphous, or oc- 

 casionally distinct, sometimes 

 opposite the petals and equal to 

 them in number, sometimes 3 or 

 times as many. Anthers adnate, tiu-ned outwards or pro- 

 immediately from the point of the filament. $ Sepals 

 and petals as in the $ ; sometimes reduced to a single sepal 

 and petal on the same side of the carpels. Carpels solitary or 

 whorled, distinct or partially united. Styles terminal or at 

 the base, simple or trifid. OatiIc sohtary, ampliitropal, with 

 the foramen superior. Drupe usually berried, 1 -seeded, 

 oblique or lunate, compressed, its nucleus hoi'se-shoe shaped, 

 with an interior plate from the base as high as the middle, 

 arismg from the connate legs of the pericarp. Seed of the 

 same shape as the fruit ; embryo curved, or tm-ned in the 

 direction of the circvunference ; cotyledons flat, sometimes 

 lying face to face, sometimes distant from each other and lying 

 in separate cells of the albmnen, which is thin or fleshy, some- 

 times rvuninated, rarely none ; radicle superior, but its posi- 

 tion is occasionally obscured by the cm'vature of the seed. 



The opinions of Botanists are di\'ided respecting the true 

 place of these plants in a Natural arrangement. Almost 

 everybody stations them near Anonads, some of which, now 

 separated as a distinct Order, under the name of Kadsm-ads, 

 were found to agree wdth them in havuig a twining habit, 

 while the whole resemble these in the ternary division of 

 their flowers. De Candolle also points out a resemblance 

 with Sterculiads, consisting in the monadelphous stamens, and 



Fig. CCXII.— Cissampelos tropaeolifolia. 1. 

 bare ; 3. a perpendicular section of a fruit. 



? flower ; 2. a portion of a fruit, with the seed laid 



x2 



