MAGNOLIACEJE. 



161 



ceum, whose apex alone is seen through the superior opening of the 

 staminal tube, consists of a free ovary, tapering above into a style, which 

 is somewhat dilated at the tip, and obscurely divided into tubercles 

 covered with stigmatic papilla}. The ovary is one-celled, with two or 

 three parietal placentas superposed to the sepals, each bearing several 

 descending,' somewhat curved, subanatropous ovules, with the micro- 

 pyle looking upwards and inwards (fig. 214). The fruit is a polysper- 



Canella alba. 



Fig. 214. 

 Longitudinal section of flowi 



Fig. 215. 

 Flower without the corolla. 



mous berry, and the seeds contain copious fleshy albumen, which lodges 



a tolerably long curved embryo near the apex and back of the seed.* 



Of this genus but one or two species are known, of American 



origin. Of these the chief is C. alha^ the plant which furnishes the 



' On each placenta there may he two, three, 

 or four, rarely more, inserted at different 

 heights. Each is suspended by a short, very 

 slender funicle, which descends very obliquely 

 from the edge of the placenta to be inserted into 

 the middle of the concave edge of the ovule, 

 where it becomes continuous with the raphe. 



" The outer seed-coat is thick, crustaceous, 

 and shining ; the inner, soft and membranous. 

 Around the hilum is a small, circular, whitish, 

 rudimentary aril. The albumen is fleshy, very 

 copious; the embryo, about half as long as the albu- 

 men, is quite eccentric, placed on the opposite 



VOL. I. 



side to the raphe, with its often somewhat un- 

 equal cotyledons downwards. The micropyle 

 forms a short, slightly curved beak. There may 

 be as many as half a dozen seeds in the berry, 

 whose thin skin is lined by a pulpy layer of 

 no great thickness. 



^ MUEK., Syst. Veg., 443. — C. Winter ania 

 G,12ETN., loc. cit. — Winterania Canella L., 

 Spec, 636.— PoiR., Bid., viii. 799; Ilhistr., t. 

 399.— MiEES, op. cit., 116, n. 1, t. 23 A. The 

 second species admitted by Miees {loc. cit., 118) 

 under the name of C. obtusifolia, which gi-ovvs in 

 Maracaibo, is perhaps only a variety of the former. 



