398 



NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



Conospermum sphacelatum. 



lip, while the three others are narrow and compose a trifid anterior 

 lip. The androceum is irregular ; it is formed of four dissimilar 

 stamens, superposed to the lobes of the perianth and inserted about 

 its throat. The posterior stamen is the most perfect ; it consists of a 

 short bifurcated filament, on either branch of which is inserted a free 

 cell of the same size as its fellow. The anterior stamen has also a 

 filament and a two-celled anther ; but the cells are sterile and reduced 

 to very small scales. The lateral stamens are symmetrical with regard 

 to each other, the anterior cell being sterile like that of its neighbour 

 of the anterior stamen, and similarly the posterior cell is fertile. 

 This last is inclined in the bud towards the corresponding cell of the 

 posterior stamen. Each is concave on the surface which looks towards 



its neighbour, and by their application edge 

 to edge a cavity is formed which contains the 

 pollen. This is freed when the two half-cells be- 

 longing to different stamens separate, a little 

 before anthesis. Hence there is a sort of synge- 

 nesious arrangement which may fairly be 

 compared with what is found in most Com- 

 jwsita. The gynaeceum is free ; it consists of 

 a one-celled ovary covered with hairs, which 

 are especially abundant round the edges of its 

 horizontally flattened top. From the centre of 

 the platform thus formed rises a style, very 

 slender at the base, and swelling slowly 

 towards its apex, which ends in an oblique 

 stigmatiferous head, and which is more or less folded on itself 

 in the bud. The stijnnatiferous head often remains 



Fig. 238. 

 Long, section of flower (*). 



sticking 



to 



the glandular base of the sterile anther on anthesis. In the ovary 

 is a single descending orthotropous ovule. The dry indehiscent 

 one-seeded fruit bears a crest formed by the accrescence of the hairs 

 which crowned the ovary. The embryo is fleshy exalbuminous, and 

 its radicle looks downwards. Conospermum consists of some forty 

 species of Australian shrubs. 1 They have alternate simple entire leaves 



1 Geah., in EJinb. Phil. Journ. (1826), 171. 

 — Endl., Nov. Stirp. Dec, 58. — Hook., in 

 Mitch. Exp. Trop. Austral., 342. — Lindl., 

 Swan Riv., 30. — Schltl., in Linncea, xx. 578. 

 — Meissn., in PI. Preiss., i. 518; ii. 248; in 



Hook.Jonrn. (1852), 184; (1855), 71.— Kipp., 

 in Hook. Journ. (1855), 70. — F. Muell., Fragm., 

 i. 157; vi., 223. — Benth. & P. Muell., ' Fl. 

 Austral, v. 362. 



