352 LXVIII. SAPINDACE.E. 



Alectryon. 

 Seed cut vertically (mag.)- 



(sometimes 2-several-) ovulecL FEUIT a capsule, samara, drupe, or berry. EMBEYO 

 curved, or rolled into a spiral. 



TREES, SHRUBS or UNDERSHRUBS, rarely HERBS. STEM with watery juice, erect 

 or climbing, often furnished with tendrils. LEAVES alternate, or very rarely opposite, 

 generally compound, sometimes appearing simple by the suppression of the la.teral 

 leaflets ; petiole sometimes winged ; stipules caducous, or often 0. FLOWERS $f , or 

 polygamo-dicecious, racemed or panicled, pedicels bracteolate at their base, the 

 lower often changed into tendrils. CALYX of 5 usually unequal sepals, the 2 posterior 

 often united in one, all more or less connate, sestivation imbricate. DISK fleshy, 

 free, or lining the base of the calyx, sometimes regular, forming an entire ring, or 

 lobed between the petals and stamens, sometimes unilateral, shorter, or wanting at 

 the posterior part of the flower, prolonged anteriorly into a lamina, sometimes 

 double, or divided into glands opposite to the petals. PETALS 0, or inserted outside 

 the disk, alternate with the sepals, the posterior often wanting, the others eqifal or 

 unequal, imbricate or rarely sub-valvate ; claw velvety, or glandular within, furnished 

 in all the petals, or the anterior only, with a hooded or crest-like scale which often 

 terminates in an inflexed appendage. STAMENS usually 8, sometimes 10, rarely 5 

 (very rarely 2, 4, 12 or oo), usually inserted within the disk, rarely on its edge or 

 around its base, often excentric or unilateral; filaments filiform-subulate, free or 

 united at the base, equal or unequal ; anthers introrse, dorsifixed, dehiscence 

 longitudinal. OVARY free, central or excentric, a little oblique, 3- (rarely 2-4-) 

 celled ; style terminal, simple ; stigma* as many as cells ; ovules anatropous or campy- 

 lotropous, inserted at the angle of the cells, usually solitary, sometimes geminate, 

 usually ascending, with a ventral raphe and inferior micropyle, very rarely numerous 

 and horizontal, or inverted, funicle often swollen. FRUIT 2 3-4-celled, or 1-celled by 

 suppression, rarely 5-6-celled (Dodoncea) ; sometimes a woody, coriaceous or mem- 

 branous loculicidal, septicidal, or circumsciss capsule; sometimes samaras winged 

 on their back, base or top, usually indehiscent ; sometimes a drupe or berry. SEEDS 

 globose or compressed ; testa crustaceous or membranous, sometimes winged, often 

 arillate or largely unibilicate. EMBRYO exalbuminous, rarely straight, often bent, or 

 rolled into a crozier ; cotyledons incumbent, sometimes transversely folded, frequently 

 confluent into a fleshy mass ; radicle facing the hilum, usually inferior, very rarely 

 superior. 



