MONUIIACE^. 295 



America, and especially to Brazil." They are trees or shrubs, with 

 the leaves usually opposite, very rarely verticillate. The flowers are 

 arranged in few-flowered, pedunculate biparous cymes, either 

 one or several of which occupy either the axil of a leaf or the 

 extremity of a little axillary branch, itself bearing several leaves at 

 its base. 



There are several American species in which the male flowers 

 become oligandrous. M. elegans; for instance, has ten or twelve 

 stamens, and sometimes only eight in certain flowers. The allied 

 species form a passage between the American Mollinedias and several 

 Old World plants that have been made the types of distinct genera. 

 Their androceum presents, as we shall see, the same diminution in 

 the number of its pieces, but all the other important characters of 

 flower and fruit are the same as in MoUinedia, and prevent our 

 keeping distinct the genera that have been named Kihara, Ephijjpi- 

 andra, Wilkiea, and Maiiho'.a. 



This name Kihara^ has been used to designate plants from tropical 

 Asia, in which the female flower (figs. 328-330) and the fruit are 

 exactly those of the American Mollinedias. Their male flowers 

 possess only from five to ten stamens, constructed exactly like those 

 oi MoUinedia ; and the divisions of the female perianth, somewhat 

 variable in number,'' are doubled by several iiiflexed laciniate pieces, 

 perhaps representing sterile stamens.' The leaves of these trees are 

 opposite, and the dioecious flowers are collected in many-flowered 

 axillary or terminal cymes. No character of any value allows us to 

 consider Kihara as other than a separate section of MoUinedia, inter- 

 mediate between the oligandrous American species and the Australian 



• Ruiz & Pav., 8yst., 141. — Speeng., Sysi. six. These leaves arc thick at the base, entire 

 J^e^f., ii. 544. — ScHLTii.,iww(Ea, xx. 114. — TuL., or very finely ciliatej and reflexed in the bud. 

 Ann. Se. Nat., ser. 4, iii. 40 ; 3fon., 375-399, The outermost are the shortest, and resemble 

 402,403; Maut., Fl. Bras., Monimiac., 313. — the bracts situated lower down on the wall of 

 Benth., pi. Hartweg., 250. — Griseb., Fl. Brit. the receptacle. 



W.-Ind., 9. — Gardn., Hook. Journ. (1842) * Their number is either that of the larger 



530; (1845), 136. — A. DC, Seem. Journ. of leaves, or more frequently greater. We should 



Bot., iii. 220 ; Prodr., loc. clt. — Walp., Ann., remark that in the American MoUhwdias there 



i. 572 ; iv. 103. are often two of the four perianth leaves which 



^ TuL., Ann. Sc. Nat., loc. cit., 44, n. 14 ; become similarly reflexed, the upper bent por- 



Mon., 398, n. 21. — A. DC, op. cit., 668, n. 25. tion becoming nearly vertical, while they are 



^ Endl., Gen., n. 2016. — Tul., Hon., 403. — narrower and less entire than the outer leaves. 



A. DC, Prodr., xvi. s. post., 670. — Brongniartia M. ligustrina TuL. {Ann. Sc. Nat., loc. cit., 



Bl., Bijdraj., ii. 435 (nee K.). — Sciadicarpus 44) stands almost alone in having all the pe- 



Hassk., Flora (1842), Beibl., ii. 20. rianth leaves nearly equal, and equally erect, and 



* There are four or five (as in fig. 329) rarely afterwards spreading in anthesis (p. 294, note 2). 



