BANUNCULACE^. 



51 



adnate cells, deliiscing longitudinally by nearly marginal clefts.' The 

 carpels, also very numerous, are eacli composed of a unilocular ovary, 

 surmounted by a style grooved vertically along the whole of its inner 

 border, and slightly dilated at the tip. The whole of the upper part 

 of its lips is covered with stigmatic papilla?. In the inner angle 

 of the ovary is a placenta which bears a fertile descending ovule 

 with its micropyle upwards and inwards ; and above it, in two ver- 

 tical rows, are a few'" sterile ovules reduced to minute cellular nuclei. 

 The fruit is multiple, consisting of as many achenes as there were 

 carpels ; the fleshy albumen"* of the seed surrounds a minute embryo. 

 In other species of this genus, such as Traveller's Joy ( C. Vitalba 

 L., Fr. Herbe aux Gueux) the 

 flower may equally consist of 

 four sepals, or it may have 

 five, six, or more. From six 

 to eight or ten are almost 

 constantly found in the beau- 

 tiful large-flowered species 

 cultivated in our conserva- 

 tories, as C. lanuginosa, patens, 

 jlorida, &c. The sestivation 

 is on the whole the same as 

 C. Vitalba, but the thin 



Clematis Viticella, 



Fig. 92. 



Fruit. 



Clematis Vitalba. 

 Fig. 93. 

 Fruit. 



m 



inflexed portion of the sepal is here much broader.^ We find 

 the same condition in C. Viticella L., and the other species which 

 have been united with it into a special section.' They are also dis- 

 tinguished by another feature ; the achene is only surmounted by a 

 short point (fig. 92) formed by the persistent base of the style. In 

 the other species, such as C. Vitalba, the style persists on the summit 



' In C. Viticella the lines of dehiscence 

 are slightly internal ; so too in C. Vitalba. 

 They are decidedly lateral in C. cirrhosa ; in- 

 trorse in Atragene and Naravelia. Messrs. 

 Bentham & Hooker say (Oen. i.) : " Antherm 

 introrstim deldscant in Clcinatidibus 2 in- 

 dicix." 



^ The number varies; there are usually four 

 in two vertical rows ; more rarely two only, or 

 six or eight. The superior ovules arc always the 

 least developed. M. Rceper saw, in 181!) (Bot. 

 Zeil., 1852, col. 187), four ovules in C.integrifolia. 

 Pater was the first to show, in C. cahjcina, the 

 order of the evolution of the five ovules {Organog., 



253, t. 58). The existence of these abortive ovules 

 is another mark of the resemblance between Cle- 

 matis and Anemone. 



3 Its consistency varies; it may even hoooino 

 quite horny. 



"• It is especially in these that we have imbri- 

 cation after the opening of the flower. (See note 1, 

 p. 50.) 



* Viticella Dill., Nov. Gen. Oiess. 165.— 

 SPACir, Siii/. a Buff. vii. 272.— Sect. ii.. IK'.. 

 Sysl. i. 160, Vrodr. i. 8. Vilicella, admitted :is a 

 genus by SniUNOE {Fl. des Jard. &<•., iii. 80). 

 includes Clematis Vilicella, Viorna Jlorida, 

 cccrulea and cylindrica. 



e2 



