CORNACEE. 
SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 63 
CORNUS. 
FLowers perfect; calyx minutely 4-toothed; petals 4, valvate in estivation ; 
stamens 4; ovary 2 or rarely 38-celled; ovules solitary, suspended. Fruit drupaceous, 
1 or 2-seeded. Leaves opposite or rarely alternate, destitute of stipules, deciduous. 
Cornus, Linneus, Gen. 29 (1737).— Adanson, Fam. Pl. ii. 
158.— A. L. de Jussieu, Gen. 214.— Meisner, Gen. 
153. — Endlicher, Gen. 798. — Bentham & Hooker, Gen. 
i. 950. — Baillon, Hist. Pl. vii. 79. 
Benthamia, Liadley, Bot. Reg. xix. t. 1579 (1833). — Meis- 
ner, Gen. 153. — Endlicher, Gen. 798. 
Eukrania, Rafinesque, Alsograph. Am. 59 (1838). 
Cynoxylon, Rafinesque, Alsograph. Am. 59 (1888). 
Benthamidia, Spach, Hist. Vég. viii. 106 (1839). 
Glabrous or pubescent trees and shrubs, with astringent bark, slender terete unarmed branchlets, 
scaly buds with accrescent scales, and fibrous roots; or herbs. Leaves opposite or rarely alternate and 
clustered at the ends of the branchlets, conduplicate or involute in vernation, petiolate or subsessile, 
entire or obscurely serrate, hirsute with tuberculate roughened hairs on the upper surface, silky-pilose 
and often glaucous on the lower, deciduous. Flowers small, terminal or axillary, white or greenish 
white, in close cymes or heads surrounded by a conspicuous involucre of four to six large petal-like 
scales, or yellow, precocious, umbellate, the sessile umbels surrounded by four small deciduous scales ; 
or white or cream-color, in dichotomously branched cymes. Calyx-tube turbinate, urceolate or cam- 
panulate, terete, angled or winged, the limb minutely four-toothed. Disk epigynous, pulvinate, depressed 
in the centre, or obsolete. Petals four, oblong or ovate, inserted on the margin of the disk. Stamens 
four, exserted ; filaments filiform or subulate, inserted on the margin of the disk, alternate with the 
anthers oblong, introrse, versatile, attached on the back near the middle, two-celled, the cells 
5? 
opening longitudinally. Ovary inferior, two or rarely three-celled ; style exserted, simple, filiform or 
petals ; 
columnar, crowned with a single capitate or truncate stigma ; ovules suspended from the interior angle 
of the apex of the cell, solitary, anatropous; raphe dorsal; micropyle superior. Fruit drupaceous, 
ovoid or oblong, areolate at the apex and often crowned with the calyx-lobes or the remnants of the 
style, free or (Benthamia) confluent into a fleshy tuberculate syncarp ; sarcocarp dry; putamen bony or 
crustaceous, two-celled, two or sometimes one-seeded. Seed oblong, compressed ; testa membranaceous. 
Embryo straight or slightly incurved, as long as the copious fleshy albumen and surrounded by it; 
cotyledons foliaceous ; radicle terete, elongated, turned towards the hilum.’ 
Cornus is widely distributed through the three continents of the northern hemisphere, and south of 
the equator appears in Peru with a single species.” In North America, where the species of Cornus are 
Three 
of these are arborescent; the other American species are large and small shrubs, and herbs of boreal 
more numerous than in other parts of the world, sixteen or seventeen have been distinguished.® 
1 The species may be conveniently grouped in the following sec- 
tions .— 
1. Flowers in close cymes surrounded by an involucre of four 
large petal-like scales. Herbaceous. 
2, Flowers in close cymes surrounded by an involucre of four to 
six white petal-like scales. Arborescent. 
3. Flowers capitate, surrounded by an involucre of four white or 
cream-colored petal-like scales; drupes confluent into a fleshy 
syncarp. Arborescent. 
4. Flowers umbellate, the umbels surrounded by green decidu- 
ous scales. Arborescent or frutescent. 
5. Flowers white or cream-color, in cymose panicles, ebracteo- 
late. Arborescent or frutescent. 
2 Bentham & Hooker, Gen. i. 950. 
8 Coulter & Evans, Bot. Gazette, xv. 30, 86. 
