LEGUMIN0S2E-MIM0SE2E. 



same variations in the numbers of all the parts. 1 But the pods, 

 covered with prickles, open in a way peculiar to themselves, sepa- 

 rating into four panels by as many longitudinal clefts. Of these 

 panels two are lateral and are usually the narrower; they correspond 

 to the ordinary valves of a Leguminose pod. The two others, despite 

 their breadth, represent the dorsal and ventral edges. This latter 

 edge bears the seeds" attached to the middle of its interior face by 

 very slender funicles. This genus contains half a score known 

 species, 3 prickly herbs or undershrubs with the bipinnate leaves of 

 Mimosa. Their inflorescence consists of axillary spikes, short and 

 globular in Euschranckia* elongated and cylindrical in the section 

 RhodostacJrt/s. 



LeuccencC has the pentamerous flowers of a diplostemonous Mimosa, 

 possessing a gamosepalous calyx with valvate teeth, and five alternating 

 free petals, not touching at all by their contracted bases and valvate 

 above. The ten stamens superposed to the perianth-leaves possess 

 free filaments inserted beneath the foot of the ovary, and glandular 

 introrse two-celled anthers. The shortly stipitate ovary is multi- 

 ovulate, and is surmounted by a style, dilated and hollow at its 

 stigmatiferous apex. The pod is straight and flattened, with a rigid 

 pericarp opening simply into two longitudinal valves. There are 

 no complete false septa separating the rather oblique seeds. Leuccena 

 consists of unarmed trees and shrubs ; seven or eight species arc 

 known/' all from the warmer regions of America, except one alone, a 

 native of the Pacific which has spread over all the warm countries 

 of the globe. The leaves are alternate bipinnate ; the petioles often 

 glandular. The flowers form globular pedunculate capitula, either 

 connected into racemes, or in pairs, each pair on a very short rudi- 

 mentary axillary branch. Each flower is axillary to a bract tapering 

 at the base and dilated at the apex. 



Desmanthui has little flowers, formed like those of Leucana and 



1 Their petals usually cohere to a greater ex- 4 It is only in this section that the species are 

 tent, sometimes forming an infundihnliform corolla not constantly pentamerous. 



(usually pink). Some flowers are polygamous. 5 Besth., in Hook. Journ., iv. 416. — I?. H., 



Gen., 594, n. 389. 



2 They are angular, and compressed against 6 J acq., Hort. ScJicenbr., t. 394 — DC, 

 one another at either end. Prodr., ii. 467, n. 192.— WaHP., R<i>, i- 88 I i 



v. 586; Ann., i. 263; iv. 616. 



3 All are American, except a single species 7 W., Spec, iv. 1044 (part.). — G.EBTN., 

 common to America and the west of tropical Fruct., ii. t, 148.— K., Mimos., L15. DC., 

 Africa.— Vent., Choixde Plant. ,t. 28.— Walp., Prodr., ii. 113 (sect. 2, Besmanthea, excl. 

 Rep., i. 883; v. 586; Ann., i. 2G3 ; ii. 451.— sect. 1, 3).— Endl., Gten^ n. 6828 (part),— 

 Oliv., Fl. Prop. Afr., ii. 336. 13. H., Gen., 592, a. 386. 



VOL. II. 



I) 



