RUTACE^E 



585 



revolute entire margins, stont midribs, slender obscure spreading primary veins, and 

 reticulate veinlets. Flowers yellow, appearing in March on short stout pedicels, 



in densely flowered terminal cymes; sepals 3, minute, united below, free above, 

 much shorter than the 3 oval or obovate petals rounded at the apex; stamens 3; fila- 

 ments about as long as the petals; anthers ovate or oval; ovary 3-celled, globose- 

 ovate; styles thick, 3 (teste Urban}. Fruit: mature fruit not seen. 



A glabrous tree, sometimes 18-20 high, with a slender stem and stout red-brown 

 branches unarmed in Florida specimens, or in the West Indies furnished with short 

 recurved spines; more often shrubby. 



Distribution. Shores of Bay Biscayne and at Fort Lauderdale, Florida; rare 

 and still very imperfectly known; on the Bahama Islands and in Cuba. 



2. HELIETTA, Tul. 



Trees or shrubs, with slender terete branches. Leaves opposite, long-petiolate, tri- 

 foliate, persistent; leaflets sessile, obovate-oblong, obtuse, entire or crenate, subco- 

 riaceous, grandular-punctate, the terminal the largest. Flowers regular, perfect, 

 on slender bibracteolate pedicels, in terminal or axillary panicles; calyx 4-parted, the 

 divisions imbricated in the bud, slightly united at the base, persistent; petals 4, im- 

 bricated in the bud, hypogynous, oblong, concave, glandular-punctate, reflexed at 

 maturity; stamens inserted under the disk; filaments shorter than the petals, slightly 

 flattened, glabrous; anthers ovate, cordate at the base, attached on the back below 

 the middle; disk free, cup-shaped, erect, subcorrugated, with a sinuate margin, 

 4-lobed, the lobes entire or crenate and opposite the petals; ovary minute, sessile, 

 depressed, 4-lobed, glandular-verrucose or minutely pilose, the lateral lobes slightly 

 compressed, 4-celled; styles united into a single slender column crowned by the globose 

 3-4-lobed stigma; ovules collateral, anatropous. Fruit obconical, composed of 3 or 4 

 dry woody 1-seeded indehiscent carpels with a cartilaginous endocarp and with 

 prominent horizontal wings, separating at maturity. Seed linear, oblong, seed-coat 

 crustaceous, fragile, black; cotyledons straight, obtuse. 



Helietta is distributed from the valley of the Rio Grande in Texas to Brazil and 



