94 



NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



AmJierslia nobilis. 



pyles upwards and outwards. The bivalve pod is elongated com- 

 pressed coriaceous and woody, with the placentary suture thickened 

 and dilated. The seeds, varying in number, which it encloses, con- 

 tain within their coats a fleshy exalbuminous embryo. A. nobilis, 1 



the only species of this genus, comes from 

 Martaban. Its unarmed branches are 

 covered with alternate paripinnate leaves, 

 accompanied by narrow caducous folia- 

 ceous stipules, and its flowers are collected 

 into long lax pendulous terminal racemes. 

 Each floral pedicel is axillary to a ca- 

 ducous bract, and bears below the flower 

 two large red lateral bracts, which are at 

 first valvate and form a sort of sheath 

 around the flower-bud, finally separating 

 to free the flower, on either side of which 

 they persist. 



The flowers of Hinnbohltia; though 

 much smaller than those of Amkerstia, 

 resemble them except in one point : their stamens are free 

 instead of being diadelphous. In certain Asiatic species of this 

 genus the oppositipetalous stamens are reduced to short sterile 

 tongues, or even disappear altogether. The four or five species of 

 this genus are natives of the west of tropical Africa, 3 India, and 

 Ceylon. 4 They are unarmed shrubs with paripinnate leaves and 

 flowers in solitary or geminate racemes, which are terminal or in- 

 serted on the wood of the old branches. These flowers also are 

 accompanied by two coloured lateral bractlets which touch by their 

 edges^'and envelope the flower-bud. 



Scholia? has altogether the flower of Humboldt '/ 'a, with the four 

 sepals and five petals similarly imbricated, the ten free or nearly free 



Fig. 67. 

 Diagram. 



1 Wall., loc. cil. — Walp., Rep., v. 567. — 

 Hook., in Bot. Mag., t. 4453. 



2 Vahl., Si/mb. Bot., iii. 106. — DC, Prodr., 

 ii. 488. — Endl., Gen., n. 6792. — B. H., Gen., 

 579, 1003, n. 341. — Batschia Vahl., op. cit., 

 39, t. 56 fnec Gmel., nee L., nee Thtjsb.). 



3 The flowers of the African species, which we 

 shall call H. africana, have ten fertile stamens, 

 whose filaments are united for a very short dis- 

 tance at the hase, and are inflexed in the bud. 

 The ovary usually contains four descending 



ovules in two rows. The base of each ovule is 

 more or less completely surrounded by a projec- 

 tion of the placenta, and its micropyle looks 

 upwards and outwards. Near the bottom of the 

 floral receptacle is a gland projecting into its 

 cavity. 



4 R. Be., in Wall. PI. As. Par., iii. 17, t. 

 238.— Wight & Abn., Prodr., i. 284. — WlOHT, 

 Icon., 1. 1605-1608.— Wa LP., Rep., i. 84 1 ; Ann., 

 iii. 852 ; iv. 608. 



6 Jacq., Collect., i. 93. — Lame., Diet., vii. 



