TILIACE^. 47 



whole plant is covered. Stipules soon falling ; leaf- 

 stalks variable, from J^ to 5 inches ; blades 2 to 4 inches 

 across, deeply or shallowly five-lobed, the lobes acute 

 and irregularly toothed. Flower-stalks in the axils of 

 the upper leaves, longer than the petioles ; bracteoles 

 three, large and leaf-like, meeting round the base of the 

 flower. Calyx white, thin, in the form of a tube split 

 down one side. Corolla when fully open up to four inches 

 across. Staminal-tube with anthers all the way up. 

 Stylar branches five, with round red stigmas. Capsule, 

 1 to Yz inch, pointed, splitting open in five acute, hairy 

 valves, t. 36. Wight Ic. 951. 



By the edges of sholas ; flowering in the colder months, 

 September to January. Nilgiris : Ootacamund to Kotagiri and 

 below. Pulneys : on the downs quite common. Fyson 2206, 

 1743. Bourne 446, 2489. 



Gen. Dist. South India and Ceylon on the higher mountains. Not on 

 the ghats to the North (C.B.F.). 



It is perhaps worth noticing that the duty of protecting the 

 petals and inner parts of the flower, ordinarily left to the sepals, 

 is here undertaken by the large bracteoles, and that the calyx has 

 degenerated to a thin tube, while the petals are thickened at the 

 top where they are exposed. 



TILIACE/E. 



Of this family, as given in the Gen. Plant., one genus, 

 EL^OCARPUS, is represented here, with two species. 

 They are trees with simple alternate leaves, and lateral 

 cymes or spikes of perfectly regular flowers, consisting of 

 five sepals valvate in bud, five petals, numerous stamens 

 standing in a raised centre, and an ovary of several (a 

 variable number of ) cells topped by a single style and 

 ripening into a fleshy fruit with one or more stones. 



In most of the genera the fruit is dn-, not fleshy ; and the inner bark, 

 like that of the MalvaceL^ is fibrous and slimy with mucilage. Because it 

 has not this mucilage and its anthers are very slender and open by gaping 

 at the end and not along lateral slits, el.^eocaRPus is by some systematists, 

 e.g., Engler und Prantl, separated together with some half dozen other 

 genera into a distinct family. 



