SAXIFRAGAGE2E. 



333 



Tahlia capemis. 



Fig. 374. 

 Flower (\). 



Fig. 375. 

 Long. sect, of flower. 



numerous seeds are small and albuminous. The four known species 

 of Vahlia) inhabit Asia, but chiefly Tropical and South Africa. They 

 are annual herbs, often glandular and pubescent, with dichotomous 

 stems and branches. The leaves are opposite, entire, exstipulate. 

 The flowers are paired 

 in the axils of the leaves ; 

 and the latter being re- 

 placed by opposite bracts 

 at the end of the 

 branches, form terminal 

 racemes or spikes. 



Donatio? has herma- 

 phrodite flowers, with a 

 hollow obconical recept- 

 acle. On its rim are 

 usually inserted five sep- 

 als, and five alternat- 

 ing petals ; and in the concavity is the ovary, three-celled, with a 

 multiovulate placenta descending in a mass, with the ventral ano-le 

 of each cell. The top of the ovary is slightly concave ; on it we see 

 three recurved subulate styles, stigmatiferous at the apex, and 

 corresponding with the cells below ; alternate with them stand three 

 stamens, whose subulate filaments are slightly coherent at the base, 

 and bear a didymous extrorse anther. The fruit is dry and three- 

 celled, and finally opens broadly at the apex. It then forms a 

 conical sac with two or three divisions, containing numerous oblong, 

 glabrous seeds, diverging in all directions from the very narrow 

 surface on which they are attached. Some flowers of Donatio, may 

 have seven or eight sepals and ten petals ; others have only two 

 cells to the ovary, two styles, and two alternating stamens. Two 

 species of this genus are known, 3 one from the extreme South of 

 America, the other from the heights of New Zealand and Tasmania. 



1 Reichb., Ic. Exot., t. 91. — Wight, HI., t. 

 115 j Icon., t. 562, 563.— Haet. & Sond., Fl. 

 Cap., ii. 306. — Walp., Rep., ii. 362 ; Ann., ii. 

 687 ; vii. 900. 



2 Fobst., Char. Gen., 9, t. 5.— J., Gen., 300. 

 — Lamk., Diet., Suppl., ii. 500; III., t. 51. — 

 DC, Prodr., iv. 63. — A. S. H., in Mem. Mus., 



ii. 119.— Endl., Gen., n. 4630.— B. H., Gen 

 634, n. 1. 



3 Hook., Icon., t. 16. — R£sr., in C. Gay Fl. 

 Chil., iii. 39. — Hook, f., Fl, Antarct., ii. 281 ; 

 Fl. Nov.-Zel., i. 80, t. 20.— Benth., Fl. Austral 

 ii. 450. 



