334 CVIII. SAXTALACEiE. 



celled anthers. Disk spread thinly over the tube, inconspicuous. 

 Style elongate, obtuse or sub-3-lobed. Drupe ellipsoid, 

 crowned by the (finally deciduous) limb of calyx. — DC. Prod, 

 xiy.p. 635 ; Thes. Cap. t. 199. 



Slender shrubs, scrambling or half-climbing through larger shrubs ; the 

 branches pendulous. Leaves alternate, lanceolate or ovate-lanceolate. 

 Flowers axillary, 1-3 together.— 1 Eastern district and Natal species, 

 another in Abyssinia. 



4. THESIUM, Linn. 



Elowers bisexual. Calyx prolonged above the ovary, the 

 free part salver-, funnel-, or bell-shaped ; 5- (rarely 4-)lobed, 

 persistent or at length deciduous ; lobes mostly with a tuft of 

 hairs, rarely glabrous. Stamens at the base of each lobe ; 

 filaments linear. Disk mostly indistinct. Style reaching the 

 stamens or much shorter ; stigma obtuse or capitate. Nut 

 ellipsoid, dry, mostly crowTied by the persistent limb of calyx, 

 nerve-ribbed. — DC. Frod. xiv. p. 637. 



Herbs or small shrubs, widely dispersed in the Eastern hemisphere. 

 Leaves alternate, mostly narrow and glabrous, rarely expanded. Flowers 

 commonly cymose, sometimes capitate, spiked panicled or dispersed. — 62 

 species at the Cape, from various parts of the colony. 



5. THESIDIUM, Sond. 



Flowers dioecious. Calyx above the ovary bell-shaped or 

 subrotate, 4- (rarely 5-)fid, glabrous, except a tuft of hairs in 

 the male flowers towards the anthers. Males : Stamens at 

 base of each lobe ; filaments slender. Females : Style short ; 

 stigma obscurely 3-lobed. Kut as in Thesimi. — DC. Frod. 

 xiv. p. 673. 



Annuals or small undershrubs. Leaves alternate, minute, often scale- 

 like. Flowers axillary, sessile or subsessile, mostly solitary, in lax spikes. 

 — 6 species, dispersed. 



Order CIX. EUPHORBIACE^. 



Flowers unisexual. Calyx free, 4-6-cleft or -parted, valvate 

 or imbricate, rarely 2- or many-leaved or 0. Petals usually 0, 

 when present alternating with the calyx-lobes, short and scale- 

 like or well developed. — Male flowers : Stamens definite or 

 indefinite, free or monadelphous ; anthers 2-celled. — Female 

 flowers : Ovary sessile or stipitate, 2-3- or many-celled, the 

 margins of the valves inflexed and adnate to a central column ; 

 ovules solitary or in pairs, pendulous ; styles as many as the 

 carpels, free or variously united or obsolete ; stigmas united 

 or distinct. Fruit (very rarely fleshy) of 2-3 or more (usually 



