428 Mr. Woods on the Species of Fedia. 



section of its fruit, the cells are detached and have no common dissepiment. 

 A contraction between the barren cells and the fertile one forming a slight 

 furrow on each side of the fruit is marked in both species, and I find it to 

 exist in F. carinata ; but according to the figure of De CandoUe, such a de- 

 pression must also sometimes exist in F. hamata, and it does not exist in 

 F. turgida. On the whole, it appears that this section requires a re-examina- 

 tion, but I have not at present sufficient materials to define it more accurately. 

 My attention at Rome was not drawn to F. turgida (fig. 28.) until the plant 

 was so far advanced as to offer me no flowers and hardly any seed. Its general 

 appearance so closely resembles that of F. olitoria that it does not press on our 

 attention. Gussone describes F. carinata as " eco7'07iato" which made me at one 

 time imagine that his plant might be the F. turgida, but his account agrees in 

 other respects too precisely with the F. carinata to allow this suspicion to 

 remain. The F. brachycarpa of Bertoloni is, perhaps, the F.platyloba of Du- 

 fresne and De Candolle. The latter botanist says that his plant is found " in 

 regione Mediterranea," but with a mark of doubt. Reichenbach only says of 

 his F. rotata, that it came from the botanic garden at Gottingen. 



Hitherto I have confined myself to characters derived from the fruit, which 

 seems in this genus to furnish the best specific distinctions. We must not, 

 however, altogether reject other particulars. Gussone, who has ten species in 

 the Prodromus Flora' Siculce, and seems carefully to have studied the subject, 

 divides the Fedix into those whose bractese are appressed when the plant is in 

 fruit, and those where they are spreading ; and the character first mentioned in 

 the specific phrase is that of a stem rough at the angles, or altogether smooth. 



In the first division are : 



F. comucopice . . . Flowers ringent. 



sicula Calyx equal, erect, cyathiform. 



coronata Calyx equal, spreading, campanulate. 



■ eriocarpa Angles rough. Calyx oblique, six-toothed. 



niicrocarpa . . . . Angles smooth. Calyx oblique, entire. 



In the second : 



F. puberula Angles rough. Calyx with 3 teeth, one of which is larger 



and longer than the rest. 



