CVIII. SANTALACER. 33 
men and axile embryo.—Trees, shrubs, undershrubs or herbs, 
often having parasitical attachment to the roots of other 
plants. Leaves simple, opposite or alternate, exstipulate, 
often glaucous. Flowers small, greenish, white or pale-yellow. 
Calyx not prolonged as a tube above the ovary. (Large 
shrubs, with opposite leaves.) 
Calyx 4-lobed ; lobes deciduous in fruit . . . . 1. Osyris. 
Calyx 5-lobed ; lobes persistent in fruit . . . . 2. RHOIOCARPUS. 
Calyx sensibly prolonged as a tube above the ovary. 
(Small shrubs or herbs, with alternate, often 
minute leaves.) 
Flowers bisexual ; calyx 5-lobed. 
Fruit a thin-shelled, fleshy drupe . . . . . 3. OSYRIDOCARPUS. 
Fruit a dry, hard-shelled, ribbed nut . . . . 4. THESIUM. 
Flowers dicecious ; calyx 4-lobed; leaves small or 
BeMieike ee . © pe ae oe Oe ERSEDLUM. 
1. OSYRIS, Linn. 
Flowers bisexual (or diwcious). Tube of the calyx slender 
in the males ; in the females or hermaphrodite, obconic ; limb 
deeply 3-4-lobed ; lobes ovate, acute, with or without a few 
deciduous hairs on the surface. Stamens 3-4; filaments 
short; anthers 2-celled. Disk concave, with round lobes, 
covering the upper and undivided part of perianth. Ovary 
fleshy; style short; stigmas 3-4. Drupe ovoid-globose, 
crowned with broken vestiges of the limb and disk.—DC. 
Prod. xiv. p. 632. 
Shrubs or trees, chiefly of the Northern hemisphere.—O. compressa, 
A. DC. (Fusanus compressus, Lam.), our only species, is a common, glau - 
cous shrub, with opposite leaves, very variable in shape. 
- 2. RHOIOCARPUS, A. DC. 
Flowers bisexual, 5- rarely 6-fid; tube narrow-obconic ; 
lobes ovate, acute, persistent, with a tuft of hairs on the sur- 
face. Stamens with slender filaments and 2-celled anthers. 
Disk subconeayve, with very obtuse, short lobes. Style cylin- 
drical-conical ; stigmas 5, short. Ovary fleshy. Drupe ovoid, 
crowned with the persistent limb of the calyx.—DC. Prod. 
xiv. p. 634. 
A shrub, with the habit of Osyris compressa, from which it is known by 
the persistent, 5-fid limb of perianth.—LHastern districts. 
3. OSYRIDOCARPUS, A. DC. 
Flowers bisexual. Calyx obconical at base, and there ad- 
hering to the ovary, prolonged upwards into a cylindrical- 
funnel-shaped tube, 5-lobed at apex, a tuft of hairs on the 
middle of each lobe. Stamens 5, inserted beneath the lobes 
near the apex of tube; filaments slender, equalling the 2- 
