864 TREES OF NORTH AMERICA 



LXII. VERBENACE^:. 



Trees or shrubs, with opposite simple entire persistent leaves, without stipules. Flowers 

 perfect; calyx 5-toothed or parted, persistent under the fruit; corolla 4 or 5-lobed, the lobes 

 imbricated in the bud; stamens 4, inserted on the tube of the corolla in pairs of different 

 lengths, anthers 2-celled, introrse, the cells opening longitudinally; ovary sessile on the an- 

 nular disk; style simple, 2-lobed and stigmatic at apex. Fruit a fleshy drupe or a capsule. 



The Verbena family with seventy-eight genera, largely composed of herbaceous plants, is 

 widely scattered through temperate and tropical regions. Some of the species are impor- 

 tant timber-trees, the most valuable being the Teak, Tectoria grandis L. f., of southeastern 

 Asia and the Malay Archipelago, and some of the tropical species of Vitex. 



CONSPECTUS OF THE ARBORESCENT GENERA OF THE UNITED STATES. 



Flowers in axillary or terminal racemes; staminodium 1; ovary imperfectly 4-celled; fruit a 

 fleshy drupe. 1. Citharexylon. 



Flowers cymose in pedunculate spikes or heads; staminodium 0; ovary 1-celled; fruit a cap- 

 sule. 2. Avicennia. 



1. CITHAREXYLON L. 



Trees or shrubs, with coriaceous lustrous leaves, slightly angled branchlets, without a 

 terminal bud, and with minute axillary buds. Flowers small, on short ebracteolate pedi- 

 cels, alternate or scattered on the filiform rachis of a slender raceme; calyx membranaceous, 

 tubular-campanulate, truncate, minutely 5-toothed, spreading and cup-shaped under the 

 fruit; corolla salver-form, usually white, the spreading limb somewhat oblique, 5-lobed, the 

 lobes broad-ovate, rounded, slightly unequal, the 2 posterior exterior, sometimes reduced 

 to staminodia; stamens included; filaments short, filiform, slightly thickened at base, the 2 

 anterior filaments longer than the others; anthers oblong; staminodium 1, posterior, linear, 

 acute, rarely fertile; ovary ovoid, incompletely 4-celled by the development of two parietal 

 placentas, gradually narrowed into a short included style; ovule solitary in each cell, erect, 

 attached laterally near the base, ascending, anatropous; micropyle inferior. Fruit a 2- 

 stoned 4-seeded fleshy drupe tipped with the remnants of the style, with thin flesh and a 

 thick-walled bony stone separable into 2 2-seeded compressed smooth light brown nutlets 

 rounded on the back and concave on the inner face. Seed erect, without albumen, filling 

 the seminal cavity; seed-coat membranaceous, light brown; embryo subterete, straight; 

 cotyledons thick and fleshy, oblong, much longer than the short inferior radicle turned 

 toward the oblong basal hilum. 



Citharexylon with about twenty species is confined to tropical America, where it is dis- 

 tributed from southern Florida through the West Indies to southern Mexico, Lower Cali- 

 fornia, Bolivia, and Brazil. 



The generic name, from Ki6dpa and &\ov, is a translation of the English West Indian 

 name Fiddle Wood, a corruption of the earlier French-colonial Bois Fidele, in allusion to the 

 strength and toughness of the wood of the trees of this genus. 



1. Citharexylon fruticosum L. Fiddle Wood. 

 Citharexylon villosum Jacq. 



Leaves oblong-obovate to oblong, acute, acuminate, rounded or emarginate at apex, and 

 gradually narrowed at base, with thickened slightly revolute margins, and glabrous or 

 coated with short pubescence (var. villosum Schulz); conspicuously reticulate- venulose, 

 pale green, 3'-4' long and I'-l^' wide, with a broad pale midrib rounded on the upper side 

 and remote prominent arcuate veins; petioles stout, grooved, f in length, separating in 

 falling from an elevated nearly circular persistent woody base. Flowers fragrant, appear- 

 ing throughout the year on slender pedicels from the axils of scarious pubescent bracts, in 

 drooping axillary pubescent racemes crowded near the end of the branches and 2'-4' long; 

 calyx coated with pale hairs, or sometimes nearly glabrous; corolla f ' across the expanded 



