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or not, in the same plant. Melastoma lias a berry ; the 

 rest a capsule, usually of four or five cells, in some ge- 

 nera of but two, or one." Linnseus mentions Melastoma 

 as the only arboreous genus. The rest are herbaceous, 

 (rarely shrubby,) with opposite or alternate leaves ; sta- 

 mens from fourto twelve, pistil always solitary, the stigmas 

 either four or one. 



"These plants are mostly inodorous and insipid, ex- 

 cept a styptic property in the root of Lythrum ; none of 

 them are used in the shdps. It is remarkable in this 

 order particularly, that some flowers are sessile and axil- 

 lary, but towards the summit the leaves gradually dimi- 

 nish, and are finally obliterated, so that the inflorescence 

 becomes a spike, as may be seen in Epilobium." 



Order 18. Bicornes. "So called," by Linnaeus, 

 " from the anthers, which in many of this tribe terminate 

 in two beaks. The plants are rigid, hard and evergreen, 

 almost all more or less shrubby ; certainly perennial. 

 Diospyros is arboreous. The leaves of this order are al- 

 ternate, simple, undivided, scarcely crenate, permanent. 

 Stipulas and bracteas wanting;" (certainly not always 

 the latter). " Calyx of one leaf, more or less deeply four 

 or five cleft. Corolla usually monopetalous ; in Pyrola, 

 Clethra, and their near allies, pentapetalous. Nectaries 

 none, except in Kalmia." (Linnaeus can here mean only 

 the pouches which for a while detain the elastic stamens, 

 and those are by no means nectaries.) "Stamens from 

 four to ten, answering to the divisions of the corolla, or 

 twice their number. Pistil 1 , except Royena, which is 

 digynous. Germen in some superior; in others, as Vac- 

 cinium, inferior. Some have a capsule, others a berry ; 

 the cells of each four or five ; but Diospyros has a fruit of 

 eight cells. The seeds are either one or many in each 

 cell, mostly small, chaffy." Linnaeus remarks that "they 

 can scarcely be raised in a garden, especially as the 

 plants are many of them natives of boggy situations ; " 

 but our English gardeners are masters of their treatment, 



