136 



NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



Detarium 1 (figs. 129, 130) comes very near Copaifera in its flower : 

 it has the same usually tetramerous perianth, 2 with scarcely im- 

 bricated sepals ; 3 ten hypogynous stamens, 4 of which the five larger 

 are superposed to the sepals ; and the same central gynaeceum with 

 its sessile biovulate ovary, 5 surmounted by a style with a little 

 stigmatiferous head, rolled in the bud towards the anterior side of the 

 flower. Bat the fruit is a large sessile compressed orbicular drupe. 



Detarium senegalense. 



Fig. 129. 

 Flower (f). 



Fig. 130. 

 Longitudinal section of flower. 



Its one-seeded stone is rugose and bony, surrounded by sarcocarp 

 whose flesh is traversed by a rich network of branching fibrovascular 

 bundles. The two known species of this genus 6 are unarmed tires 

 from the west of tropical Africa, with alternate paripinnate pauci- 

 foliolate leaves. The flowers form compound ramified racemes of 

 spikes, 7 either axillary or lateral on the wood of last year's branches. 

 The flowers of Hardmckia* scarcely differ from those of certain 

 species of Copaifera. The receptacle is the same ; the calyx consists 

 of five sepals with thin edges imbricated in the bud. The stamens 



1 J., Gen., 365. — DC, Prodr., ii. 521.— 

 Spach, Suit, a Buffon, i. 131.— B. H., Gen., 

 585, n. 361.— H. Bn., in Adansonia, vi. 200. 



2 The two posterior sepals are usually united 

 into a single piece, but may be occasionally found 

 separate. Hence the flower is resupinate, as in 

 Copaifera. 



6 Only the edge is bevelled, and this bevelled 

 edge it is which alone overlaps or is overlapped 

 in aestivation. 



4 The filaments are at first bent on themselves 

 near the insertion of the anther. 



5 The ovules are descending, anatropous, with 

 the micropvles superior and exterior. The exo- 



stome is thickened so as to simulate a young 

 caruncula at anthesis. The carpel is always 

 superposed to the anterior sepal. 



6 Gmel., Stfst., iii. 700.— Hook., Niger, 

 327.— Guill. & Peue., Fl. Seneg. Tent., i. 269, 

 t. 59.— Waxp., Rep., \. 854.— Out., FL Prop. 

 Afr., ii. 312. 



' The floral pedicel is either absent or very 

 short, and articulated at the base ; axillary to a 

 bract and accompanied by two lateral bractlets. 



8 Roxb., PI. Coromand., iii. 6, t. 209. — 

 DC, Prodr., ii. 487.— Exdl., Gen., n. 6808.— 

 B. H., Gen., 586, n. 364.— H. Bn., in Adan- 

 sonia, vi. 203. 



