224 ON SEEDLINGS 



Stem with primary internodes undeveloped. 



First leaves simple, entire, radical, opposite, decussate, linear, 

 cylindrical, acute, sessile, fleshy, glabrous, green, without any apparent 

 venation ; subsequent leaves in pseudo-whorls of from six to eight. 



PORTULACE.E. 



Benth. et Hook. Gen. PI. i. 155. 



Fruit and Seed. The pistil is syncarpous and free, or half 

 inferior in Portulaca, one-celled, two- to many-ovuled, and con- 

 sists of three, rarely two, carpels. The amphitropous ovules 

 vary from two to many, except in Portulacaria, which has only 

 one, and arise from the base of the ovary separately, or the 

 funicles are connate into a central column. 



The fruit is a capsule, splitting by as many valves as there 

 are carpels, or dehiscing circumscissly as in Portulaca ; rarely 

 indehiscent as in the one-seeded winged fruits of Portulacaria 

 and Silvsea. The seeds are numerous or solitary by arrest, 

 and reniform, or lenticular, laterally compressed, or obovoid ; 

 testa generally crustaceous, shining and smooth or often 

 granulate as in species of Portulaca, sometimes furnished with 

 an arilloid, or swelling of the funicle, as in Talinum. The 

 embryo is nearly always curved round the periphery of a 

 scanty, farinaceous endosperm, when the cotyledons about 

 equal the terete radicle in length. 



A good type of the Order is furnished by Portulaca grandi- 

 flora, the seeds of which are reniform, laterally compressed, 

 with a thick and a thin end, and a minutely granulate crusta- 

 ceous and shining testa. 



As regards means of dispersion, Portulacaria has winged 

 fruits, and Grahamia winged seeds ; in Anacampseros some 

 species have seeds with three wings while others are wingless. 



The embryo is curved round the periphery of the seed, 

 enclosing in its sinus a small quantity of endosperm, and 

 nearly encircling the greatest circumference ; the cotyledons 

 are plano-convex, linear-oblong, and being situated in the 



