OAKESIA CONRADII. 



duced Klotzsch's generic character, merely changing the name to 

 Oakesia. This character was again repeated, soon after, by Hook- 

 er, accompanied by a figure of the plant, with some good anal- 

 yses of the flowers, which, he remarks, do not so well accord with 

 Dr. Klotzsch's description as could be wished.* Hooker has well 

 represented the perianth or scales of the flower. He also detected 

 an abortive pistil in one of the sterile flowers. The fruit was un- 

 known to him, and, indeed, that possessed by Mr. Tuckerman and 

 Dr. Klotzsch was said to be abortive. 



Good fruit, however, was gathered by Mr. Oakes, and communi- 

 cated both to Dr. Torrey and myself; it has also ripened in the 

 Botanic Garden at Cambridge. The mature drupes are represented 

 of the natural size in the right-hand figure of the accompanying 

 plate ; they are no larger than a pin's head, and have, even when 

 fresh, only a thin coating of juiceless flesh. In the dry state, the 

 cartilaginous pyrenae may be made to separate by considerable 

 pressure, when they incline to open by the ventral suture ; but I 

 believe the fruit is never spontaneously dehiscent. The erect seed, 

 which fills the cell of each pyrena, has a taper embryo in the axis 

 of fleshy albumen, of two thirds its length, the radicle being, of 

 course, inferior, and the cotyledons very short. 



In order rightly to estimate the value of the characters assigned 

 to the genus Oakesia, it will be necessary to correct some errors 

 which prevail respecting Empetrum itself. The late Professor Don, 

 in drawing out the characters of the order Empetreie, stated that the 

 ovary rests on a fleshy disk ;t which character is more strongly pre- 



• Icones Plantarum, Vol. VI. (or II. new series), t. 531 (1843). 

 t "Ovarium disco carnoso impositum." Don,m Edinl. New Phil. Jour- 

 nal, Vol. II., p. 62. 



2 



