146 Mr. J, Miers on the Styracese. 



In regard to the next point, althougli I may not have been 

 sufficiently precise in stating that the ovules in the Styracinea 

 are borne upon cup-shaped podosperms, I find there, what is 

 nearly equivalent, that they are almost sessile upon rugose 

 prominences of the placenta, which conceal their micropylar ex- 

 tremity, — the raphe, as above shown, being next the axis in the 

 upper series : these prominences, whether considered as portions 

 of the placenta, or as belonging to the funicles, are precisely 

 analogous to the protuberances he has shown to exist in nume- 

 rous other cases, where he calls them "telse conductrices -"^ — 

 as in Calla, tab. 2. fig. 10 ; Arctostaphylos, tab. 9. figs. 15 & 

 16; Cluytia, tab. 15. fig. 16; Hebenstreitia, tab. 17. fig. 11; 

 Hedera, tab. 20. fig. 2 ; Erinus, tab. 28. figs. 1 & 2 ; and, finally, 

 he shows these very prominences in Styracc officinale, tab. 21. 

 fig. 13, which he defines thus : " gemmulas in placenta lobosa 

 magna inter lobos inserta."^ The central placentation attached 

 to the short incomplete dissepiments cannot be doubted, follow- 

 ing as a necessary consequence of the structure above demon- 

 strated. 



Prof, Agardh (/. c. tab, 22. figs. 16 & 17) confirms my obser- 

 vations upon the direction of the o\Tales in Halesia tetrapterw. 

 he also repeats what I have said, that in the ripe seed the 

 chalazal extremity is either superior or inferior, according to 

 whether an erect or pendent ovule has been fertilized ; but his 

 view of the structure of the ovary, that the expansion of the 

 placenta divides its space into superior and inferior cells, is not 

 borne out by the facts as they appear to me. He says also, re- 

 garding the ovules, " raphe et in adscendente et in pendula ex- 

 trorsa :'' to me, on the contrary, this seemed in both instances 

 directed towards the axis of the ovary, or, perhaps, somewhat 

 lateral to it, and in either case therefore introrse : in this respect 

 they appear to difi"er from those of the Shjracinece, being thus 

 heterotropous, while in the latter tribe, if we regard the fact of 

 their resupination, they are all isotropous. The position I have 

 assigned to the raphe in Halesia is moreover proved by its 

 direction in the ripe seed, where it is always turned away from 

 the wall of the nut, and facing the centre of its open space ; and 

 this is constantly the same, whether the chalaza be superior or 

 inferior in regard to the apex of the fruit. 



at its base is adnate to the calyx. Richard probably had confounded the 

 flower of Halesia, which is hardly distinguishable from that of Shjrax, ex- 

 cepting the difference in question. 



