202 Mr. J. Miers on the Tribe Colletiese. 



Buenos Ayres : one species is a native of the island of Juan 

 EernandeZj in the Pacific. The genus is readily distinguished 

 from most others of the Culletiece by the absence of petals, — a 

 character partaken of only by one other, which I have proposed 

 under the name of Notojihoena, from which it is at once recog- 

 nized by the peculiar form of its disk. In many genera of the 

 tribe the tube of the calyx is circumscissile in the line of its 

 contraction above the basilar intumescence ; Colletia differs from 

 them in having its circumscissile zone midway between that line 

 and the base, so that when the tube falls away, it carries with it 

 its annular disk, and when seen from below, it seems closed by 

 a diaphragm, pervious only for the passage of the style. When 

 the fruit is half immersed in the persistent cupular base of the 

 calyx, its epicarp forms a loose skin, which breaks round the 

 margin of the cup, leaving its lower moiety persistent within it, 

 while the upper moiety splits at the same time, to allow the 

 separation of the three cocci (consisting of endocarp), which 

 spring out of the calycine cup with elastic force, each coccus 

 bursting by its axial line, as in Euphorhiacea, &c. ; the remain- 

 ing portion of the epicarp attached to the cocci comes off like a 

 loose skin ; but the mesocarp, which is membranaceous, adheres 

 to the corneous endocarp. 



Colletia, Comm. — Char, emend. Calyx cylindricus vel urceo- 



lato-tubulosus, imo tumescens et hinc demum circumscissus, 



8-10-striatus, limbo 4-5-fido, laciniis acutis reflexis, intus 



carina prominula calloque apicali notatis, sestivatione valvatis. 



Petala nulla. Stamina 4 v. 5, inter lacinias calycis, rarius 



sub faucem, inserta ; filamenta subulata, compressa, laciniis 



fere a3qualia vel breviora, erecta, apice ssepe inflexa; anther'ce 



sub-2-lobse, reniformes, oscillatorise, transversim 2-valves, 



valva antica quam postica breviore, et rima hippocrepica late 



hiantc. Discus imo tenuissimus aut fere evanidus, ibique ad 



fundum calycis adnatus, margine (in coarctationem tubi) 



libero latissimo et convolutim inflexo hinc valde conspicuus, 



carnosus, et annularis. Ovarium superum, globosum, 3-sul- 



catum, 3-locularej ovula in locu.lis solitaria, c basi erecta. 



Stylus filiformis, calyci ?equilongus. Stigma parvum, obtuse 



3-lobum. Fructus siccus, subglobosus, 3-sulcatus, calycis 



cupula semi-iramersus, subcapsularis, in coccos 3 solubilis, 



coccis crustaceis, rima ventrali elasticc 2-valvatim dehiscenti- 



bus, monospermis. Semen crectum, ovatum, vix compressum, 



ventre subangulatum ; tunica externa nitida, durissima, cornea, 



hilo basali pervio et transversali ; integumcntum secundum 



membranaceum, et medio substantia laxe cellulosa subcoriacea 



opaca ad priorem agglutinatum, raphigerum ; raphe filiformis. 



