LYTHRARIACEm. 



435 



Cuphea mieropetala. 



those of Adenaria^ Grislea^ etc. They are tetramerous, without 

 accessory tongues alternating with the petals, and have from twelve 

 to an indefinite number of stamens. 

 The ovary has four multiovulate cells, 

 and the fruit is a septifragal capsule. 

 They are woody plants of Mexico and 

 the Antilles, Tetrataxis, a tree of 

 Mauritius, has the same organs of 

 vegetation and tetramerous but apeta- 

 lous flowers, and only four alternisepa- 

 lous stamens. Its fruit is a septifragal 

 capsule. In Lagerstrcemia (fig. 405, 

 406), beautiful trees or shrubs of east- 

 ern Asia, the flowers, pentamerous or 

 hexamerous, have the petals well deve- 

 loped, with a long narrow claw, an 

 elegantly undulated limb, and an indefinite number of stamens. The 



Cuphea pubifiora. 



Fig. 401. Long. sect, of gynse- 

 cium of open flower. 



Fig. 402. Flower. 



Fig. 403. Diagram. 



Fig. 404. I(0ng. sect, of flower. 



fruit, surrounded only at the base by the receptacular cupule, is free 

 above : it is a loculicidal and 3-6-valved capsule, the numerous seeds 

 of which are prolonged upwards in a membranous wing. The leaves 

 are opposite or verticillate, and the flowers, often very beautiful, 

 are grouped in ramified clusters of cymes. Duahanga is from 

 tropical Asia and Oceania. Yery near Lagerstrcemia^ it has a larger 



28—2 



I 



