8 magnoliacettc. [Magnoliacea . 



2 or more In each carpel. Seeds without any arillus, but the outermost coat 

 usually fleshy. Embryo minute, at the base of a copious oily albumen, which 

 is not ruminate. — Trees, shrubs, or climbers. Leaves alternate, undivided, 

 and usually entire. Stipules lateral, adhering to the petioles, but soon de- 

 ciduous, or rarely none. 



Magnoliacca are not very numerous, and are chiefly natives of the mountainous districts 

 of central, southern, and eastern Asia, and northern and tropical southern America. 



Flowers hermaphrodite. Carpels spicate. Trees or shrubs 1. Magnolia. 



Flowers unisexual. Carpels capitate. Climbers 2. Kadsura. 



1. MAGNOLIA, Linn. 



Flowers hermaphrodite. Sepals 3. Petals 6 to 12. Carpels biovulate, 

 laterally attached to the axis in a dense spike, coriaceous when ripe, and open- 

 ing by a longitudinal slit. — Trees or shrubs. Leaves entire. 



A genus of but few Asiatic species, with several from N. America. 



1 . M. Championi, Benth. An erect shrub, growing out sometimes into a 

 small tree. Leaves oblong, 4 to 6 inches long, coriaceous, glabrous or sprinkled 

 with a few hairs underneath. Peduncles axillary, one-flowered, short, thick, 

 and densely covered with silky hairs. Flowers appearing after the leaves are 

 out, about li in. long, cream-coloured, and very fragrant at night. Petals 6. 

 Anthers very numerous. Carpels 2-ovulate, very thickly silky-hairy, when 

 ripe thick and hard, almost woody, shortly apiculate, and opening longitudi- 

 nally. Seeds usually solitary, oblong, scarlet, hanging by a filiform funiculus 

 long after the carpels have opened. — Talauma pumila, Champ, in Kew Journ. 

 Bot. iii. 255, but not of Blume. 



Eather scarce on Victoria Peak, where it is shrubby ; more common and subarboreous in 

 the woods of the Happy Valley, Champion, but not as yet known out of the island. It is also 

 planted in gardens according to Champion, but it is probable that the cultivated plant is the 

 common M. pumila, referred by Blume rather doubtfully, and probably without sufficient 

 grounds, to Talmcma. The present species, described from Victoria Peak specimens, is cer- 

 tainly a Magnolia, not a Talauma. It has the stature, foliage, and inflorescence of M. pu- 

 mila, but in the latter species the peduncles are much more recurved and glabrous, as well 

 as the ovary, the flowers rather smaller, etc. 



2. KADSURA, Juss. 



Flowers unisexual (dioecious). Sepals 3. Petals 6 or 9. Stamens inde- 

 finite, the short filaments either free or united at the base in a fleshy column. 

 Carpels indefinite, with 2 or 3 ovules in each, succulent when ripe, and united 

 in a globular head. Seeds usually 2 in each carpel, superposed, enclosed in 

 pulp and separated by a spurious succulent dissepiment. — Climbers. Leaves 

 entire or toothed. Flowers white or reddish. 



A small genus, confined to eastern Asia. 



1. R. Chinensis, Ranee, n. sp. A dioecious glabrous climber. Leaves 

 oval-oblong, about 3 to 5 in. long, thickly coriaceous, entire or remotely 

 toothed. Peduncles 1 -flowered, axillary, shorter than the flower or the fruit. 

 Male flowers ovoid, 8 or 9 lines long. Staminal column acuminate, rather 

 shorter than the petals, bearing in the lower portion a number of short thick 



