BIXACE2E. 



297 



X. COCHLOSPERMUM SERIES. 



Cochlospermum* (fig. 343) has beautiful hermaphrodite regular 

 flowers, with receptacle slightly convex, bearing five sepals 2 

 quincuncially imbricated, caducous, and five alternate petals, con- 

 torted in pignoration. Higher up are inserted a large number of 

 hypogynous stamens, each formed of a free filament, 3 and an almost 



Cocldospermum Gossypium. 



Fig. 343. 

 Flower. 



basifixed, elongated anther with two cells, 4 opening inwardly from 

 the apex 5 by an orifice sometimes very short, sometimes a little more 

 elongated and constituted by two short clefts, which circumscribe, 

 in uniting above, a short triangular panel. The gyna^ceum is supe- 

 rior, composed of a free one-celled ovary, surmounted by a tubu- 

 lar style, with stigmatiferous extremity, entire or slightly dentate. 

 In the ovary, in front of the sepals, are seen five falciform parietal 

 placentas (or only three, the two lateral placentas disappearing), 

 facing each other at their concave edge. Below they generally 

 come in contact, so that the ovary at this level becomes pluri- 



1 K., Malvac., 6. — Cambess., in Mem. Mus., 

 xvi. 402. — Endl., Gen. n. 5405. — Pl., Sur la 

 Nouv. Fam. des Cochlospermees (in Hook. 

 Lond. Journ., vi. 306).— B. H., Gen., 124, 971, 

 n. 1. — Benth., in Journ. Linn. Soc, v. Suppl., 

 78. — H. Bn., in Adansonia, x. 259. — Maxi- 

 miliana Mart., in Flora (1819), 451. — Wit- 

 telshachia Mart. & Zucc, Nov. Gen. et Spec., i. 

 80, t. 55. — Azeredia Aruud. (ex Allem., 

 Desenb. Arritd., c. ic). 



2 Occasionally four or six. 



3 Sometimes a little longer on one side of tbe 

 flower than on the other. 



4 Each divided into two cellules in the greater 

 part of their length. 



5 Often surmounted by a small point. 



fi Planchon has distinguished two subgenera : 

 Diporandra, the anthers of which open by 

 two pores, and Eucochlospermum, where there 

 is only one. 



