LYTHRAKIM 547 



LYTHRARIE.E. 



Benth. et Hook. Gen. PL i. 773. 



Fruit and Seed. The two- to six-celled ovary composed of 

 as many carpels is mostly superior or free, rarely girt at the 

 base by one or more glands, and still more rarely wholly 

 immersed in the receptacle as in Punica and Axinandra. 

 One-celled ovaries may arise by the destruction of the septa, 

 or by one out of two carpels becoming suppressed. The ovules 

 are numerous, multiseriate, anatropous, inserted on axile or 

 basal, rarely parietal placentas. They are solitary in the 

 cells of Axinandra, reduced to two in the one- celled ovary of 

 Strephonema, and inserted on a free basal placenta in the 

 one-celled ovary of Antherylium. 



The fruit is capsular, two- to six-celled with axile placentas, 

 or one-celled by the destruction of the septa when the placentas 

 become free and central. Baccate fruits occur in Punica and 

 Sonneratia which are in many respects anomalous for the 

 Order. The first named has the walls of the fruit of a thick 

 and leathery nature, while the seeds are surrounded by a deep 

 layer of watery pulp. The interior is many-celled with the 

 cells arranged in two tiers, one above the other. In other 

 and more typical cases the seeds are smaller, and terete, 

 angled or winged, exalbuminous or with a small quantity of 

 endosperm. The testa varies in different species both in 

 thickness and texture, and in some cases it is pilose or hispid. 



The embryo is generally straight, with oblong or orbicular, 

 flat, auricled cotyledons, varying in conformity with the shape 

 of the seed. An exceptional case occurs in Dodecas which has 

 small hispid seeds resembling sawdust, containing a slender, 

 elongated embryo with linear cotyledons, and a terete radicle. 

 The cotyledons of Punica are spirally convolute in the seed, 

 and auricled at the base. A good type is represented by 

 Cuphea silenoides (fig. 353). The cotyledons are suborbicular, 

 deeply auricled at the base and distinctly emarginate, the 

 emargination being due to a pronounced thickening at the 

 slightly indented chalaza. The auricles are produced in order; 



