84 WRIGHT : THE GENUS DIOSPYROS 



It is therefore possible to make a complete series from 

 flowers on the same tree, having staminate flowers at one 

 end, passing through hermaphrodite to female flowers. 



In other trees of the same species the sex is either male 

 or female and is fixed. 



D. Ebenum is included under this heading, and though 

 the dioecious condition is the most common form for this 

 species, yet observation of fresh material in the forest has 

 revealed the frequent occurrence of the monoecious and 

 polygamous state. The monoecious state consists of female 

 flowers often ripening into good fruit on a pedicel in a 

 male inflorescene. The monoecious condition in D. Ebenum 

 is unlike that in D. opppsitifolia or JX acuta, since the 

 female flowers do not occur solitary but as sporadic 

 members of a male cyme. On first examining such a 

 monoecious inflorescence the thought uppermost in my 

 mind was that here we were dealing with a male inflores- 

 cence, some members of which had reverted to the con- 

 dition of a potential gynaBcium, but this idea was abandoned 

 in consequence of the fact that each of the female flowers 

 when thus occurring possessed eight staminodes each with 

 a barren anther, and an eight-celled ovary. We therefore 

 have true female flowers occurring in the same cluster 

 as the males. 



The female flowers may occur in any part of the inflores- 

 cence, but the most usual position is that terminating the 

 inflorescence and therefore occupying the central position. 

 Since the central flower is the first formed we therefore 

 obtain a time relation in the production of sex, the female 

 flowers being produced first and the male flowers afterwards. 



The production of female flowers in the axil of the 

 youngest leaves, and that of the males in the older leaves in 

 T f */' D. acuta and D. qppositifolia is a sequence to be correlated 

 with this. 



In consequence of the complex relationships in species 

 described it is well to realize that the monoecious state in 



