122 PROCEEDINGS OF THE ACADEMY OF [March, 



THE GERMINATION OF THE SEEDS OF CARAPA GUIANENSIS Aubl. 

 BY JOnX W. HARSHBERGER, ril. D. 



The genus Carapa (nat. ord. Meliacece) comprises a number 

 of tropical forest trees with pinnate leaves and flowers borne in 

 few- or many-flowered axillary panicles. The following species of 

 ihe genus are recognized by the Index KeAvensis, viz. : Carapa 

 guiane)isis Aubl. from Guiana and tropical Africa; C. moluccensis 

 Lam. from the Malay archipelago; C. nicaraguensis C.D.C. 

 from Central America; C. procera D.C. from Asia and tropical 

 Africa; C. surinamensis Miq. from Guiana. Carapa molucceusis 

 is a mangrove, and Karsten has removed this species from the genus 

 Carapa, placing it under the generic name Xyloearpus. 



The fruits of the plants of the genus Carapa are spherical or 

 ovoid capsules, thick, woody, mostly waned, opening by septifragal 

 dehiscence into five valves. The seeds are large, thick, angular, 

 with woody brown seed-coats (PI. VIII, fxgs. 1, 2, 3, 6). The 

 food substance in the form of endosperm is wanting, and the 

 cotyledons are thick and conferruminate (fig. 8a). The only 

 illustrations of the fruits and seeds of this genus, as far as the 

 writer has been able to ascertain, are those published by Engler 

 and Prantl,^ Avhere the flowers, ovaiy and fruit of Carapa procera 

 D.C. are shown, but not in germination. Lubbock and Karsten 

 have studied the germination of the seeds of several related genera 

 of the same order, 3Ieliacece, and the substance of their studies is 

 here briefly given by way of summing up our knowledge concern- 

 ing the sprouting of the seeds of the plants of this family. Lub- 

 bock" describes and figures the germination and seedlings of Melia 

 azedarach L. and Walsura piscidia Roxb. In the pride of China 

 {Melia azederach L. ) the cotyledons are linear-oblong, obtuse, 

 narrowed to a short petiole. The first leaves are opposite, tripar- 

 tite ; the succeeding leaves are compound pinnate. The cotyledons 



' Die natilrlichen PJlamenfamilien, III, 4, s. 277. 



"^ Lubbock, Contributions to our Knowledge of Seedlings, I, 335. 



