366 URTICACE.E. 



anthers seven to ten, large and red, with small white 

 point, almost sessile on the flat broad disc. Female 

 flowers in longer racemes : pedicel J4 inch lengthening 

 to I inch in fruit : ovary green : styles two, i/io inch long. 

 Fruit ellipsoid, like an olive, ^ to 5^ inch by % inch, 

 slightly oblique, with very rough skin, and surmounted 

 by the two minute sessile stigmas. Seed one only, with 

 small embryo at the upper end. 



Very common in sholas and occasionally in the open. Nil- 

 giris : round and in Ootacamund and down to Pykara, Lovedale, 

 Coonoor. Pulneys : on the downs above Kodaikanal. Flower in 

 winter months, fruit in summer. Fyson iiSQ,"^ 1724, 1914. 

 2021, 2022. Bourne 479. 



Gen. Dist. Also Ceylon, Java, Corea. 



URTICACEit. 



Herbs, shrubs and trees with alternate leaves and 

 small flowers, complete or by reduction unisexual or still 

 further reduced. Perianth typically of four or five 

 sepals, but no petals : stamens as many opposite to 

 them : ovary superior one-celled with one ovule, but 

 stigma often two-lobed and eccentric. 



Genera 100. Species 2,000 chiefly in the tropics. 



The family is divided into seven tribes and comprises plants of such 

 different habit and arrangement of flowers as the Elm, Hop, Mulberry, 

 Jak Fruit, Fig and Nettle. Some of these are considered by some syste- 

 matists distinct families, and those represented in our areas are alone 

 described here. 



CEL TIDE^. F.B.I. 135, tribe 2. 



Trees with no milky sap. Leaves alternate, with three 

 sometimes more, main nerves at the base. Flowers 

 appearing before the leaves, solitary or in axillary 

 cymes, unisexual or occasionally complete. Sepals four 

 or five. Stamens as many erect in bud. Ovule pendu- 

 lous with its micropyle pointing upwards. Fruit fleshy. 

 Embrvo curved- 



