422 



NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



Hirtella hirsuta. 



ceum takes place, we only see two little teeth projecting from the 

 edge of this ring ; like the fertile stamens each is superposed to a 

 sepal. The gynseceum consists of a single carpel superposed to a 

 sepal;' it is made up of a one-celled ovary, and a slender gyno- 

 basic style inserted at the foot of the ovary on the side next to the 



unilateral pit of the receptacle, and ter- 

 minated by a very small stigmatiferous 

 head. Near the base of the ovary is 

 seen a placenta from which arise two 

 collateral anatropous ovules whose mi- 

 cropyles look downwards and towards 

 the insertion of the style. The fruit is 

 a drupe, whose stone contains a single 

 seed with an exalbuminous embryo, 

 thick fleshy cotyledons, and an inferior 

 radicle. 



The flowers of the other species of 

 Hirtella are similarly formed, but 

 possess a larger number of fertile sta- 

 mens. Thus H. hirsuta (fig. 500) has 

 six, possessing a pair in the place of 

 each single one of H. triandra; so too 

 with H. hrachystachya, elongata, ame- 

 ricana,^ &c. ; also with H. Thouarsiana^ 

 a species from Madagascar which had been made into a distinct 

 genus under the name of Thelira." When instead of one or two 

 stamens there are three before one or more of the sepals, the 

 androceum consists of seven, eight, or nine pieces. The fruit 

 of Hirtella is a more or less elongated drupe, whose mesocarp is 

 of very variable thickness and consistency and whose stone 

 contains a single seed, within whose membranous coats is the fleshy 



' Sepal 3, 88 in Chrysolalamis (fig. 499). 



2 AUBL., Chiian., i. 247, t. 98 (nee Jacq.). — 

 S. hexandraW., ex Rcem. & ScH., Syst., v. 274. 

 — H. nitida AV., Joe. cit. — U. racemosa Lamk., 

 Bid., iii. 133.— J/, ohlongifolia DC., loc. cit., 

 ■n. 10. — H. filiformis Phesl., Si/mb., ii. 23, t. 

 68. — H. coriacea Mart. & Ztjcc, in Abh. 

 Milnch. Akad., x. 383. This species may have 

 seven or eight stamens, wiien tliere are three 

 instead of two before one or two of its sepals; so 



again, when one or two of these pairs are re- 

 placed by single stamens, the androceum is re- 

 duced to four or five pieces ; all facts affording a 

 good exjilanation of the symmetry of the stamens 

 in this species, and some others of the same group. 



^ H. IJn., Adansonia, viii. 160. 



* Dup.-Th., Gen. Nov. Madag., n. 72.— DC, 

 Prodr., ii. 527. — Enul., Oen., n. 6412. — B. H., 

 Gen., 607 (Parinarium). — H. Bn., loc. cit., 169. 



