444 ON SEEDLINGS 



green above, or in the young state more or less stained with red ; 

 stipules ochreate, forming a sheath round the stem, and in their 

 youngest state a cap to the terminal bud, and after loosing the cap 

 becoming truncate. 



Petioles very short, semiterete, grooved above, minutely puberu- 

 lous at the margins. 



No. 1. Obovate, broad and obtuse at the apex, very shallowly 

 sinuate or nearly entire, slightly cordate at the base. 



No. 2. Rotund, obovate, much larger, broad and obtuse at the 

 apex, obsoletely angled or almost entire at the margin, cordate at 

 the base, with short rounded auricles. 



ARISTOLOCHIACE-E. 



Benth. et Hook. Gen. PL iii. 121. 



Fruit and Seed. The ovary is inferior or rarely half- 

 superior, consisting of four to six carpels cohering by their 

 edges, with the placentas projecting into the cavity and making 

 it imperfectly four- to six-celled, or cohering and forming as 

 many complete cells. The ovules are indefinite in each cell, 

 usually very numerous, horizontal or pendulous, superposed in 

 one or two series and anatropous. The fruit is sometimes in- 

 dehiscent, crowned with the persistent perianth, and liberating 

 the seeds only by decay, or it is capsular with a deciduous 

 perianth, dehiscing septicidally or breaking away from the 

 placentas. The seeds are indefinite, often very numerous, hori- 

 zontal or pendulous, immersed in a spongy cellular tissue 

 arising from the endocarp, ovoid or oblong, obtusely trigonous, 

 or compressed and flat or concave. The testa is crustaceous, 

 rugose or smooth, with the raphe in plano-concave seeds 

 fleshy and thickened or dilated. Endosperm is copious and 

 fleshy. The embryo is minute, enclosed in the endosperm 

 close to the hilum, oblong or ovoid, with the cotyledons 

 closely applied to one another and about as long as the radicle. 



Seedlings. The cotyledons attain a comparatively large 

 size during germination by feeding upon the endosperm' 

 Those of Aristolochia caudata are broadly oblong, rounded 

 and entire at either end, five-nerved at the base and strongly 



