THE MANGROVE FAMILY 51 



carpels each. Petals, like those of Lagerstroemia, crumpled in bud. Car- 

 pels arranged in two tiers, inside the hollow receptacle. Fruit a berry 

 with leathery pericarp and numerous seeds 

 embedded in a "fleshy", sweet, pellucid testa; 

 the CombretacecBj — with the well-known 

 Rangoon Creeper (Quisqualis indica), and 

 several useful timber-trees of the genus 

 Terminalia, e. g., T. tomentosa {Kan. Banapu ; 

 Tarn. Karimardu) with five brown coriaceous 

 wings in the one-seeded nut; and T. panicu- 

 lata {Ka7i. Maruva; Tarn. Pumardu) with a 

 one-winged nut. 



Fig. bo. — Terminalia 



12. The Mangrove Family tomentosa (winged fruit). 



(Rhizophoraceae). 



Trees or shrubs, mostly in brackish water. Leaves opposite, 

 mostly coriaceous, entire; stipules interpetiolar, deciduous. Flowers 

 radial. Ovary inferior. Fruit one-seeded. 



The coasts of India and other tropical countries are lined with 

 peculiar flora called <the Mangrove' to which belong several trees 

 of the BJiizopJ^racece, e.g., Rluzophora mucronata {Kan. Kandel), 

 and Brnguiera parvijiora, as well as some shrubs of other families, 

 viz., Avicenula officinalis (Kan. Uprunja), the spinous Acanthus 

 ilicifolius {Kan. Holeculli), and the fern Acrostic/mm aureum. 

 The peculiar habitat of these plants has conditioned their peculiar 

 structure. 



1. Xerophilous and hyg^rophilous habits of plants.— Even a child 

 knows that one of the couditions for the healthy growth of a 

 plant is a regular supply of water. There is a constant flow 

 of water in a tree from its root up to the leaves. But this flow 

 must not be too weak, or else the leaves begia to fade and the 

 plant dies. The flow must also not be too strong, or else the 

 plant is overfed, becomes sickly and finally dies. 



Now, the supply of water is not the same in every place. 

 Plants growing near a river-side always have water enough to 

 drink; plants growing on dry ground, however, have very little 

 water to feed on. The supply of water is also not the same at 



