274 BOMBACACEAE. 



Cotton readily separable from the seed. 1. G. liarTjadense. 



Cotton adherent to the seed. 2. G. punctatum. 



1. Gossypium barbadense L. Sp. PI. 693. 1753. 



Perennial, shrubby^ flowering as an annual, glabrous or nearly so, 1-2.5 m. 

 high. Leaves suborbicular in outline, 7.5-20 em. broad, rather deeply 3-5- 

 cleft, the lanceolate or ovate-lanceolate lobes acuminate, the basal sinus narrow; 

 petals 6-10 cm, long, yellow, or with orange or red bases, fading pink; capsules 

 3-5 cm. long; cotton readily separated from the seed. 



Scrub-hmds and waste lands, apparently spontaneous after cultivation only, 

 Abaco, New Providence, Cat Island, Great Gaillot Cay, Fortune Island and Inagua : — 

 North Carolina to Florida ; widely spontaneous after cultivation in tropical and sub- 

 tropical regions. Cotton. 



2. Gossypium punctatum Sch. & Thon. Besk. Guin. PI. 309. 1827. 



A shrub, or small tree, up to 4 m. high, the young twigs pubescent or 

 glabrate. Leaves ovate-orbicular or suborbicular in outline, cordate or nearly 

 truncate at the base, usually 3-lobed, rarely 5-lobed, or some of them entire, the 

 lobes short, ovate, acuminate, pubescent iDeneath, at least when young, nearly 

 glabrous above; petals 3-6 cm, long, white or yellowish, sometimes crimson- 

 blotched at the ba?e, fading pink or j)urj)lish; capsules 2-2.5 cm. long; cotton 

 firmly attached to the seed. 



Rum Cay, at Port Nelson : — Southern Florida ; Jamaica : Cuba ; Porto Rico ; 

 Grenada, Recorded from other West Indian islands. Cultivated in tropical regions 

 of the New World and the Old. Wild Cotton. 



Family 3. BOMBACACEAE Schumann. 



BoMBAX Family. 



Trees, mostly with palmately compound leaves and large and showy 

 perfect flowers. Calyx inferior, mostly 5-toothed. Petals 5. Stamens 

 commonly very numerous, with long" filaments and short anthers. Ovary 

 2-5-celled; style simple; stigmas as many as* the ovarj'-cavities. Fruit 

 various, dry or fleshy. Seeds usually woolly. About 20 genera and 150 

 species, of tropical distribution. 



1. CEIBA A dans. Fam. PI. 2: 399. 1763. 



Large deciduous trees, with alternate petioled palmately compound leaves, 

 and large clustered axillary flowers, the trunk buttressed at the base, the 

 branches and young trunks spiny. Calyx 5-lobed. Petals tomentose without, 

 glabrous within. Column 5-divided, each division bearing 2 or 3 unilocular 

 anthers at the top. Capsule 5-celled, loculicidally dehiscent, many-seeded. 

 Seeds long-woolly. [Aboriginal name.] About 12 species, the following 

 typical. 



1. Ceiba pentandra (L.) Gaertn. Fr. & Sem. 2: 244. 1791. 



Bomhax pentandrum L. Sp. PI. 511. 1753. 

 Eriodendron anfractuosum DC. Prodr. 1: 479. 1824. 



A tree, reaching a maximum height of 60 m. or more, the trunk above the 

 often immense buttress sometimes 3 m. in diameter. Petioles slender, glabrous, 

 5-15 cm. long; leaflets 5-7, stalked, or nearly sessile, glabrous, entire or serrate, 



