142 



NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



in tropical Western Africa ; the others, seven or eight in ntimber,^ 

 inhabit the whole of tropical America. 



VII. PHYLLANTHUS SEKIES. 



PJii/llanthus., the best known genus of this series, is not the most 

 complete type. This is found to be represented by other plants, 

 such, for instance, as WielamUa elcgans"" (fig. i;J30-2.33), a shrub 

 from the Seychelles and neighbouring isles, which has monoecious 



Wklandia cleijaiis. 



Fig. 230. Male flower, Fig. 231. Male tiuwer, Fig. 233. Female flower, Fig. 232. Female flower, 

 diagram. longitudinal section (f). longitudinal section. diagram. 



flowers, with a convex receptacle. It bears a calyx of five sepals, 

 slightly united at the base, arranged in quincviucial prfcfloration 

 iu the bud, and a corolla of five free, imbricated, alternate petals. 

 Farther in is found a cupular disk, with five but slightly prominent ^ 

 alteruipetalous angles. The receptacle" afterwards rises in a thick 

 central column which supports five alteruipetalous stamens, whose 

 nearly sessile anthers are introrse in the bud, afterwards reflexed 

 outwardly at anthesis, and have two cells deshiscing by longitudinal 

 clefts. The column is terminated by a body with five oppositi- 

 petalous branches, representing the divisions of a rudimentary 

 gyua^ceum. In the female flowers, within the i^erianth and disk, 

 similar to those of the male flo^-er, is seen a fertile gynajceum, the 

 ovary having five cells superposed to the petals and sui-mounted by 

 a style with five stigmatiferous, bi-lobcd, reflexed branches. In the 



' PcKpr. et Endl. Nov. Gen. et Spec. iii. t. 246, 

 fig. 2.— Oliv. Fl. trap. Afi: i. 344.— H. Bn. in 

 Adansonia, xi. 111. note. — Walp. JJfy;. i. 549 ; 

 ii. 829 ; v. 408 ; Ann. iv. 442. 



-' H. Bn. Euphorlnne. 668, t. 22, fig. 6-10 ; in 

 Adansmiia, ii. 32. — Sai-!a eler/ans M. Ahg. in 

 Linntpa, xxxii. 78 ; Prodi: 228. 



' Sometimes hardly distinct. 



