HTJTACEM. 



391 



Coltonema album. 



Fig. 419. 



Petal, upper 



face (\°). 



Fig. 420. 



Flower, perianth 



taken away. 



as Coleoaema} (figs. 416-421), have flowers whose anclroceum pos 

 sesses two verticils. They are, more- 

 over, regular, hermaphrodite and pen- 

 tamerous. The receptacle, slightly 

 convex, or more or less concave, often 

 bears five sepals, whose insertion is 

 consequently either hypogynous or 

 more or less perigynous, and the prse- 

 floration imbricated. The alternate 

 petals, whose insertion is the same, are 

 free, oboval, tapering below into a thick 

 claw, hollowed within on the middle 

 line of a vertical groove in which the 

 superposed staminodes are found. The 

 pignoration is imbricated. The sta- 

 mens are ten in number, superposed, 



five to the petals, and five to the sepals. These last alone are fertile, 

 each formed of a two-celled introrse anther, dehiscing by two longi- 

 tudinal clefts, surmounted by a small glandular swelling of the con- 

 nective, often spherical. Within the insertion of the androceum the 

 receptacle is thickened into a cupuliform disk, 

 entire or five-lobed, varying in height and situa- 

 tion according to the form of the receptacle itself. 

 The gynaeceum, entirely or partly superior, 

 is inserted towards the organic summit of the 

 receptacle ; it is composed of five oppositipeta- 

 lous carpels, whose independent one-celled ovary, 

 often surmounted by a dorsal horn, more or less 

 prominent, 2 contains two descending ovules, with 

 superior exterior micropyle. 3 Each ovary is sur- 

 mounted by a style, inserted at a variable height 

 in the internal angle, uniting with the other 

 styles to form an erect column with capitate, stigmatiferous apex, 

 more or less distinctly five-lobed. The fruit is formed of five com- 

 pressed shells, rugose, corniculated at the summit, the endocarp 

 separating from the exterior layers at dehiscence ; each of these con- 



Coleonema piilchrum. 



Fig. 421. 

 Fruit (f). 



1 Baetl. & Wendl., Diosm,, 55, t. A.— Spach, Suit, a Buffon, ii. 328.— A. Juss., in Mem. 

 Hits., xii. 471, t. 19, fig. 17.— Endl., Gen., n. 601G— P>. II., Gen., 289, n. 20. 



2 Often thickened, glandular at the summit. a With very distinct double coat. 



