BIGNONIACEZ. 
SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA. 97 
CRESCENTIA. 
FLowErs perfect ; calyx gamosepalous, closed in the bud, bilabiately splitting in 
anthesis ; corolla gamopetalous, ventricose on the anterior side by a transverse fold, 
obscurely 5-lobed, the lobes imbricated in estivation ; stamens, 4; staminodium, 1; disk 
pulvinate; ovary 1-celled; ovules numerous. 
alternate, coriaceous or membranaceous, destitute of stipules. 
Fruit a many-seeded berry. Leaves 
Crescentia, Linnzus, Gen. 182 (1737). — A. L. de Jussieu, Bentham & Hooker, Gren. ii. 1053. — Baillon, Hist. Pl. x. 
Gen. 127. — Endlicher, Gen. 723. — Meisner, Gen. 301. — 54. 
Cuiete, Adanson, Fam. Pl. ii. 207 (1763). 
Trees, with watery juices, scaly bark, and stout terete or slightly angled branchlets. Leaves 
alternate, solitary or fascicled, coriaceous or membranaceous, short-petiolate. Flowers long-pedunculate, 
the peduncles bibracteolate, produced in the axils of upper leaves or from the sides of the branches, 
solitary or in few-flowered fascicles. Calyx coriaceous, closed in the bud, splitting in anthesis into 
two unequal broad divisions or sometimes slightly five-lobed, deciduous. Corolla inserted under the 
hypogynous pulvinate fleshy disk, yellow streaked with purple, or dingy purple, tubular-campanulate, 
more or less ventricose on the lower side by a transverse fold, abruptly dilated into an oblique two- 
lipped obscurely five-lobed laciniately toothed limb. Stamens four, inserted in two ranks on the tube 
of the corolla, didymous, introrse, included or slightly exserted; filaments filiform; anthers oblong, 
attached on the back, two-celled, the cells divergent, opening longitudinally ; staminodium solitary, 
posterior, often wanting. Ovary sessile, one-celled, ovate-conical, gradually narrowed into an elongated 
simple style two-lobed and stigmatic at the apex; ovules numerous, attached horizontally in many 
ranks on two thickened two-lobed lateral parietal placentas, anatropous; raphe ventral; micropyle 
superior. Fruit globose or ovoid, indehiscent, rounded or umbonate at the apex, many-seeded ; 
perianth fleshy, green, thin or thick, ultimately becoming hard, light brown and separable into two 
layers, the inner thin and membranaceous, filled with the united and thickened fleshy or spongy 
placentas attached at the base by a cluster of thick fibro-vascular bundles. Seed imbedded irregularly 
in the placental mass, compressed, small, flattened on the two faces, cordate at the summitjand cuneate 
at the base, or large, suborbicular, cordate above and below, and deeply grooved on the two faces. 
Embryo filling the seminal cavity, flattened, white and waxy, or thick and fleshy, deeply grooved and 
becoming black in drying ;' radicle minute, vague, turned toward the small basal or lateral hilum. 
Crescentia is tropical American, with five or six species distributed from southern Florida through 
the Antilles to southern Mexico and Brazil. The Calabash-tree, Crescentia Cujete,’ a native of the 
West Indies and now planted in all tropical countries, is the most useful member of the genus. The 
1 By Miers (Trans. Linn. Soc. xxvi. 167) Crescentia is divided 1.111; Fragm. 30, t. 33, f. 5.— Swartz, Obs. 234. — Tussac, Fl. 
into two sections : — 
EvucrescentiA. Fruit large, rounded at the apex; pericarp 
thick and hard ; mature placentas viscid and fleshy; seeds small, 
flat on the two faces, obcordate, cuneate at the base ; hilum basal. 
Leaves fascicled. 
ENALLAGMA. Fruit small, umbonate; pericarp thin and brit- 
tle; mature placentas dry and pithy ; seeds large, suborbicular, 
cordate above and below, deeply grooved on the convex faces; 
hilum lateral. Leaves alternate. 
2 Linnzus, Spec. 626 (1753). — Jacquin, Hist. Stirp. Amer. 175, 
Antill. ii. 80, t. 19. — Descourtilz, Fl. Méd. Antill. iv. 47, t. 244. — 
Bot. Mag. 1xii. t. 3430. — De Candolle, Prodr. ix. 246. — Seemann, 
Hooker Jour. Bot. and Kew Gard. Misc. vi. 275.— Grisebach, FY. 
Brit.W. Ind. 445. — Miers, Trans. Linn. Soc. xxvi. 167. — Hemsley, 
Bot. Biol. Am. Cent. ii. 498. 
Crescentia acuminata, Humboldt, Bonpland & Kunth, Nov. 
Gen. et Spec. iii. 157 (1818). — Kunth, Syn. Pl. Aiquin. ii. 
255. — De Candolle, J. c.— Miers, /. c. 169. 
Crescentia cuneifolia, Gardner, Hooker Jour. Bot. ii. 422 (1840). 
— Miers, J. c. 168. 
