MELASTOMACE^E 543 



MELASTOMACE^E. 



Benth. et Hook. Gen. PI. i. 725. 



Fruit and Seed. The ovary is free or more or less adnate 

 to the receptacular cup ; when it matures into the fruit the 

 free portion, if any, is nearly always enclosed in the cup. It 

 varies with two to many carpels cohering to form as many 

 cells. The members of the suborder Memecyleae constitute 

 an exception, inasmuch as the septa often disappear making 

 the ovary one-celled, with the ovules arranged verticillately on 

 a free central columella. In the suborder Melastomeae the 

 ovules are very numerous and inserted on placentas that 

 project far into the interior of the ovary ; while in the suborder 

 Astronieae the numerous ovules are ascending and inserted 

 on prominent basal or parietal placentas. In all cases they 

 are anatropous. They are very few and definite in the tribe 

 Miconieae of the Melastomeae and in the suborder Memecyleae. 



The fruit is baccate or capsular, dehiscing by valves or 

 bursting irregularly. The seeds are varied in outline from 

 cuneate, cochleate, or pyramidal to filiform and are very small, 

 except in the cases mentioned where the ovules are few 

 when they are large, globose or hemispherical. The testa is 

 membranous, leathery, crustaceous and smooth or rugose, in 

 Huberia and Acanthella it is winged. The raphe is sometimes 

 enlarged and spongy. The seed is exalbuminous, and whether 

 large or small the embryo occupies the whole of the interior, 

 to which it conforms. In the suborder Memecyleae the embryo 

 is large with plano-convex or subfoliaceous cotyledons. 



Seedlings. The seedlings observed all belong to the sub- 

 order Melastomeae having numerous small seeds, consequently 

 the cotyledons even after germination are very small, or even 

 minute in Ehexia Mariana (fig. 352). The lamina is only 

 about 1-5 mm. long, by 1-2-5 mm. wide, shortly petiolate 

 and rhomboid in outline. The first three or four pairs of 

 leaves are broadly ovate, trinerved and gradually increase in 

 size from the first pair which is very small or even minute. 

 Several succeeding pairs are inclined to be elliptic and are 



