ULMACEJB. 



SILVA OF NORTH AMERICA, 



63 



CELTIS. 



Flowers polygamo-monoecious or rarely monoecious ; calyx 4 to 5-parted, the 

 divisions imbricated in aestivation ; corolla ; stamens 4 or 5 ; disk pulvinate ; ovary 

 1-celled ; ovule solitary, suspended. Fruit a fleshy drupe. Leaves alternate, decidu- 

 ous or persistent, stipulate. 



Celtis, Linnseus, Gen. 337 (1737). — Adanson, i^am. /?. ii, Mertensia, Humboldt, Bonpland & Kunth, Nov. Gen. et 



377. 

 276. 



A. L. de Jussieu, Gen. 408. — Endlicher, Gen. 

 Meisner, Gen. 348. — BaiUon, Hist. PI vi. 186- 



Bentham & Hooker, Gen. iii. 354. — Engler & Pranti, 

 Pfianzenfam. iii. pt. i. 63. 



Spec. ii. 30 (not Roth nor Willdenow) (1817). 

 Momisia, F. G. Dietrich, Lexic. Garten, u. Bat. Nachtr. v. 



128 (1819). 



Solenostigma, EndKcher, Prodr. Fl. Norf. 41 (1833). 



Trees or shrubs, with watery juice, thin, smooth, often more or less muricate hark, slender 

 unarmed or spinose branches, scaly or naked buds, and fibrous roots. Leaves condupHcate in vernation, 

 alternate, distichous, serrate or entire, often obHque at the base, penniveined, three or rarely four or 

 five-nerved, petiolate, membranaceous or subcoriaceous, deciduous or persistent ; stipules lateral, free, 

 usually scarious, caducous. Flowers vernal, minute, pedicellate on branches of the year, the staminate 

 cymose or fascicled at their base, the pistillate solitary or in few-flowered fascicles from the axils of 

 upper leaves. Calyx slightly or deeply divided into four or rarely into five lobes, deciduous. Stamens 

 as many as the lobes of the corolla, inserted under the margin of the usually hairy discoid torus; 

 filaments subulate, sometimes incurved in sestivation and spreading elastically, erect and exserted after 

 an thesis ; in the pistillate flower usually shorter and included, or rarely wanting j anthers ovate, attached 

 on the back just above the emarginate base, close together and face to face in the bud, two-celled, 

 extrorse, the cells lateral, opening longitudinally. Ovary ovate, sessile, one-celled, crowned with a short 

 sessile style divided into two divergent elongated reflexed lobes papillo-stigmatic on the inner face, 

 entire or bifid, deciduous ; in the pistillate flower minute and rudimentary j ovule solitary, suspended 



from the apex of the cell, anatrop 



Fruit ovoid or glob 



epicarp thick and firm j mesocarp thin 



and succulent ; nutlet thick-walled, bony, smooth or rugose. Seed filling the seminal cavity ; albumen 

 scanty, gelatinous, nearly inclosed between the folds of the cotyledons, or wanting ; testa membrana- 

 ceous, of two confluent coats ; chalaza colored, close to the minute hilum. Embryo curved 3 cotyledons 

 broad, foliaceous, condupHcate or rarely flat, variously folded, corrugate, incumbent on or embracing 

 the short superior ascending radicle.^ 



Celtis is widely distributed through the temperate and tropical regions of the world, fifty or sixty 



1 By Planchon (i)e Candolle Prodr, xvii. 168) Celtis is divided Indies, southern continental Asia, Ceylon, and the islands of the 



into the following subgenera : 



EuCELTis. Staminate flowers articulate, in few-flowered fascicles 



Indian Archipelago. 



SoLENOSTiGMA. Stanoinate flowers in many-flowered cymes. 



from the axils of caducous bud-scales. Pistillate flowers solitary or Pistillate flowers usually solitary; stigmas generally contracted and 



axils 



of young leaves; bifid or twice bifid at the apex. Leaves coriaceous, entire, usually 

 stigmas linear, undivided. Leaves serrate or rarely entire, deciduous. persistent. Unarmed trees and shrubs of the Old World, principally 

 Unarmed trees of the temperate regions of the northern hemisphere of the tropics. 



and of high mountains within the tropics. 



MoMisiA. Flowers in many-flowered dense cymes; stigmas 



Sponioceltis. Staminate flowers in lax cymes from the axils of linear, bifid. Leaves entire or serrate, deciduous or persistent. 



caducous bud-scales. Pistillate flowers in several flowered fasci- Trees or shrubs of the tropical and subtropical regions of the New 



cles from the axils of young leaves ; stigmas linear, undivided. World usually furnished with axillary spines. 

 Leaves deciduous or semipersistent. Unarmed trees of the West 



