SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 
CY RILLA. 
FLowers regular, perfect; calyx 5-lobed, the lobes imbricated in estivation ; petals 
5, hypogynous, contorted in estivation; stamens 5, hypogynous; ovary 2-celled, the 
cells 3-ovuled. Fruit capsular, indehiscent, 2-celled, 2-seeded. 
Cyrilla, Linnzus, Mant. 5.— A. L. de Jussieu, Gen. 160. — 254. — Baillon, Adansonia, i. 203, t. 4, f. 1, 2; Duct. ii. 
Endlicher, Gen. 1413. — Meisner, Gen. 137.— Torrey & 336. — Bentham & Hooker, Gen. ii. 1226. 
Gray, Fl. N. Am. i. 256.— Planchon, Lond. Jour. Bot. v. 
A glabrous tree or shrub, with spongy bark, slender terete branchlets conspicuously marked with 
large leaf-scars, and narrow acuminate buds covered with chestnut-brown scales. Leaves destitute 
of stipules, usually clustered near the ends of the branches, alternate, entire, oblong or obovate-oblong, 
apiculate, rounded, or slightly emarginate at the apex, coriaceous, conspicuously reticulate-veined, short- 
petioled. Flowers small, in slender racemes produced near the extremities of the branches of the pre- 
vious year from the axils of fallen leaves or of small deciduous bracts. Pedicels slender, from the axils 
of narrow alternate persistent bracts, bibracteolate near the summit. Calyx persistent, minute, divided 
nearly to the base into five ovate-lanceolate acute coriaceous segments. Petals white or rose-colored, 
inserted on an annular disk, three or four times longer than the calyx-lobes, oblong-lanceolate, acute, 
concave, subcoriaceous, furnished below the middle on the inner surface with a broad glandular nectary. 
Stamens opposite the lobes of the calyx, inserted with and shorter than the petals; filaments subulate, 
fleshy ; anthers introrse, attached below the middle, two-celled, the cells united above the point of the 
attachment of the filament, free below, laterally dehiscent. Ovary free, sessile, ovoid, pointed, two- 
celled, the division at right angles with its short diameter; styles short, thick; stigma two-lobed, the 
lobes spreading ; ovules suspended from an elongated placental process developed from the apex of the 
cell,’ anatropous; raphe dorsal; micropyle superior. Fruit broadly ovoid, crowned with the remnants 
of the persistent style, two-celled, two-seeded, the pericarp spongy. Seeds suspended, elongated ; testa 
membranaceous; albumen fleshy. Embryo minute, cylindrical, two-lobed ; the radicle superior. 
The wood of Cyrilla is hard, heavy, and close-grained, but destitute of strength; it contains thin 
conspicuous medullary rays, and is brown tinged with red, the sapwood being rather lighter colored. 
The specific gravity of the absolutely dry wood is 0.6784, a cubic foot weighing 43.28 pounds. 
1 Baillon (Adansonia, l. c.; Bull. Soc. Linn. Paris, i. 156) first character the ovules assume in growth. Le Maout & Decaisne 
pointed out the peculiar development of the ovules of Cyrilla from (Trait. Gén. Bot. 340), and after them Bentham & Hooker (Gen. 
what he describes as “‘ une sorte de saillie placentaire”’ from which J. c.), described the raphe as ventral in Cyrilla and in Cliftonia, in 
they are suspended, the raphes becoming dorsal by the anatropous which, however, as Baillon has shown, it is really dorsal. 
