400 



CLUSIACE^E. 



[Hypogynous Exookns. 



Order CXL1V. CLUSIACEiE.— Guttifers. 



Guttiferae, Juss. Gen. 243. (1789) ; DC. Prodr. 1. 557. (1824) ; Mmner, p. «j I J Wight Illustr. 1. 114 ; 

 Cumbesstdes, Mdmoire (1828).— Clusiaceae, Ed. pr. lv. (1836). 



Diagnosis.— Guttiferal Exogens, with simple opposite leaves, without stipules, symmetrical 



flowers, equilateral petals, adnate beakless anthers, solitary or few seeds, and sessile 



radiating stigmas. 



Trees or shrubs, occasionally parasitical, yielding resinous juice. Leaves without 



stipules, opposite, coriaceous, entire, with a strong midrib, and often with the lateral 



veins running through to the margin. Flowers usually numerous, axillary, or terminal, 



Pig. CCLXXXII. 



white, pink, or red, articulated with their peduncle, $ or <J $ by abortion. Sepals 2, 

 4, 5, 6, or 8, imbricated by alternate pairs, usually persistent, round, membranous, fre- 

 quently unequal and coloured like petals. Petals hypogynous, equal in number to the 

 sepals, or the same power, and sometimes passing insensibly into them. Stamens nu- 

 merous, either distinct, or combined in one or more parcels, hypogynous, rarely definite ; 

 filaments of various lengths ; anthers adnate, burstuig inwards, sometimes very small, 

 occasionally bursting outwards, sometimes 1 -celled, and sometimes opening by a pore or 

 transversely ; even immersed in a fleshy receptacle. Disk fleshy, occasionally 5-lobed. 

 Ovary solitary, superior, 1- or many-celled ; ovules solitary, orthotropal or anatropal, 

 (Endl.), erect, or ascending, or numerous and attached to central placentas ; style none, 

 or very short ; stigma peltate, or radiate. Fruit either dry or succulent, 1- or many-celled, 

 1- or many-seeded, dehiscent or indehiscent. Seeds frequently nestling in pulp ; then- 

 coat thin and membranous ; always wingless ; very frequently with an aril ; albu- 

 men none ; embryo straight ; cotyledons thick, inseparable ; radicle either turned to or 

 from the hilum. . . 



Their opposite coriaceous leaves, broken-whorled calyxes, equilateral petals, indefinite 

 stamens, and sessile radiant stigmas, must be regarded as the main features of the 

 Guttifers, to which mav usually, though not always, be added the binary arrange- 

 ment of their calyx and corolla. If these are neglected the Order merges m that oi 

 Tutsans. Dr. Wight has indeed proposed to send into that Order Clusia and all the 

 other genera having the calyx and corolla arranged in fives ; but to this proposition 

 there are great objections ; not the least of which must be the destruction of the precise 

 character of both the Orders. The reader is, however, referred to that excellent Bota- 

 nist's work above quoted, for an explanation of the reasons which have led him to this 

 conclusion. It is not a little remarkable, that a strong tendency to the separation ot 

 sexes should be found among plants so high in the scale of organisation as these are. 



Fig. CCLXXXII.— Cambogia gutta. 1 a 9 flower, with the sterile stamens surrounding the pistil; 

 2. a t? flower; 3. an anther, which opens In throwing off a cap. in consequence of transverse dehiscence ; 

 J a transverse section of the ovary. 



