Memecylon.] melastomacEjE. 117 



6. MEMECYLON, Linn. 



Calyx- tube hemispherical or campanulate ; the limb entire or obtusely 4- 

 lobed, or rarely 5-lobed. Petals 4 or rarely 5, ovate or orbicular. Stamens 

 twice as many, all similar. Anthers short, with a thick connective, forming 

 a conical spur at the base. Ovary entirely adnate to the calyx, 1 -celled. 

 Ovules attached to a central placenta. Fruit a berry, crowned by the calyx- 

 teeth or border. Seeds solitary or rarely 2 or 3, with convolute cotyledons. 

 — Trees or shrubs. Leaves coriaceous, with 1 prominent midrib, and pinnate 

 veins often scarcely perceptible. Flowers usually small, in axillary clusters 

 or cymes. 



A considerable genus, spread over the tropical regions of the Old World. 



1. M. ligustrifolium, Champ, in Kew Journ. Bot. iv. 117. A perfectly 

 glabrous shrub, with slender branches. Leaves shortly stalked, elliptical, ob- 

 tuse or obtusely acuminate, 2 to 3 in. long and about 1 in. broad, acute at the 

 base, of a thick coriaceous consistence, the veins scarcely perceptible. Peduncles 

 axillary, 2 to 3 lines long, bearing a little cyme of 3 to 5 flowers. Buds, when 

 ready to open, globular, obtuse, nearly 2 lines diameter. Calyx-teeth 4, very 

 broad and short. Ovules 8 or 10, in a ring round the short central placenta. 

 Berry 4 or 5 lines diameter, with a single seed. — M. sculellalum, Hook, and 

 Am. Bot. Beech. 186, but not of Naudin. 



Hongkong, Champion. Also S. China, Beechey. The species is allied to the common 

 M. ovatum, Sm. (or if. edule, Roxb.), but the flowers are fewer and twice the size. It can- 

 not well retain the name of scutellatum, which should be reserved for the Scutula of Lou- 

 reiro, formerly supposed by Hooker and Arnott to be this species, but which appears to be 

 a different one, from Cochin China and not from Canton. Naudin has given the name of 

 M. Ugustrimim to a different species, which I have not seen. 



Order XLII. MYRTACE^. 



Calyx-tube adhering to the ovary and often projecting above it ; the limb 

 of 4 or 5 or rarely more lobes or teeth. Petals as many, inserted on the 

 calyx at the top of the tube, imbricate in the bud. Stamens usually indefi- 

 nite, sometimes twice as many or as many as the petals, curved inwards in 

 the bud, free or variously connected. Anthers small, 2 -celled. Ovary in- 

 ferior, 2- to 5- or more celled, rarely 1-celled by incompleteness or failure of 

 the partitions. Ovules 2 or more in each cell or rarely solitary, the placentas 

 axile. Fruit dry or succulent, indehiscent or dehiscent. Seeds without al- 

 bumen. Embryo straight or curved. — Trees or shrubs. Leaves opposite or 

 rarely alternate, entire, almost always dotted. Flowers axillary or more rarely 

 terminal. 



A large Order, widely spread over South America, tropical and subtropical Africa and 

 Asia, and especially Australia, with a few South African, North American, and one European 

 species. 



Stamens 10 or 8. Leaves subulate, heath-like 1. B^eckea. 



Stamens numerous. Leaves flat. 



Calyx-tube produced above the ovary, and lobed or toothed at the top. 



Calyx-tube shortly obovate 2. Syzygium. 



