196 NATURAL SCIENCE. March, 



as their beautiful flowers. In Wovmia suffvuticosa, a large shrub 

 common in the south of the Peninsula, the carpels, when ripe, 

 split and spread out in the form of a large pink rosette, exposing the 

 small black seeds provided with a sweet red aril. The seeds are 

 carried off by birds very speedily, and so well disseminated that the 

 plant appears in all kind of odd places. W. tomentella has the same 

 arrangement, but the carpels are white. In the allied genera Delima 

 and Tetracera, the carpels are small and of an inconspicuous brown 

 colour, but the black seeds are ornamented with a fimbriated crimson 

 aril, which only partially covers them. 



The form of the fruit of the common nutmeg (Myristica moschata) 

 is well enough known, but it is interesting to compare it with 

 those of others in the genus. In M. moschata the pericarp is dull 

 yellowish, the aril a loose crimson network partly covering the black 

 testa of the seed. In M. Favquhaviana the pericarp is of a bright 

 orange-pink, while the aril is yellow and completely covers the seed. 

 In this case, and in all other similar ones that I have seen, the testa, 

 being covered completely with the aril, is merely brownish, and is not 

 jet black, as it is in all cases where the aril does not completely cover 

 it, for it is of no advantage to the seed to be fully black when the 

 contrast of the two colours would not be visible. In a few wild nut- 

 megs the fruit is bright pink outside and the aril yellow, but as a 

 rule the pericarp is not very conspicuous. 



The Euphorbiaceous genus Baccanrea is an interesting one in its 

 variety of adaptation for dispersal. In B. motleyana the fruit is 

 really baccate ; that is to say, the pericarp is soft and leathery, and 

 does not split. The berries are creamy-white, about an inch and 

 a half long, and contain three or four seeds enclosed in a white trans- 

 lucent pulp. The fruit is produced on the trunk of the tree. In this 

 position it is not easy for birds to see it or to get at it, and it seems 

 to be exclusively dispersed by mammals. The fruit much resembles 

 that of the Langsat, Lansium domesticum (Meliaceae), which is dispersed 

 in a similar way. In Baccauvea pavviflova we have the fruit produced in 

 masses at the base of the tree, where there is sometimes quite a large 

 pile of it. It is deep claret-colour, practically black, the pericarp 

 fleshy and eatable. It is, I believe, dispersed by mice, which carry oft 

 the fruits and drop the seeds about. Here the whole fruit is eaten. 



Many species of Baccauvea bear their long racemes of fruit on the 

 branches of the tree. The fruits are globose, or nearly so, and 

 capsular. They are of a greenish, or more commonly yellow or 

 orange-colour, but the pulp is bright orange. In most species, when 

 the fruit is ripe the pericarp splits in three and falls off, leaving the 

 seed enclosed in its sweet yellow pulp, hanging attached to the very 

 long placentas (B. minor). 



Before concluding, I would refer to the suggestion that has some- 

 times been made that some of the seeds of Euphorbiaceae, notably those 

 of the castor-oil plant (Ricinus), resemble beetles, and, as such, may be 



