520 



NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



Dipsactts fulloii um. 



Above its constricted neck, the receptacle is dilated to a small cupule 

 which bears a short calyx with four teeth or small lobes/ and a 

 gamopetalous corolla with a more or less elongate tube and a limb 

 most frequently divided into four lobes, unequal or nearly equal, 

 imbricate. One is anterior and covers the two lateral which ordinarily 

 envelop ^ the posterior. The latter may be replaced by two lobes 



overlapping each other. The stamens 

 are nearly always four in number, two 

 anterior and two lateral, somewhat 

 unequal. The place of the fifth (pos- 

 terior) stamen is ordinarily void in 

 flowers with a pentamerous corolla ; 

 sometimes however this stamen is 

 present, similar to the others, that is 

 composed of a filament inserted on the 

 corolla and a bilocular, dorsifixed, in- 

 trorse anther dehiscing by two longi- 

 tudinal clefts and oscillant.*^ The in- 

 ferior ovary is one-celled, surmounted 

 by a slender style the stigmatiferous 

 summit of which is divided into two short equal branches, or one 

 shorter than the other which may even disappear altogether.* In the 

 ovarian cell is a posterior placenta on the upper part of which is 

 inserted a descending ovule, with anterior raphe and micropyle directed 

 upwards and inwards.^ The fruit, crowned or not with the recepta- 

 cular cupule and calyx, and surrounded by the involucel which adheres 

 for a variable extent or remains entirely free, is an achene with 

 longitudinal ribs, most frequently eight in number. The descending 

 seed encloses, under its very thin coats, a fleshy albumen and an 

 embryo the oval or oblong cotyledons of which are inferior and the 

 short radicle superior. 



The Teazels are dicarpous or perennial herbs, the surface of which 

 is covered with prickles more or less rigid, sometimes confluent, or 



Fi^^. 413. 

 Fruit (I). 



Fig. 414. Lon< 

 sect, of fruit. 



^ Entire or ciliate, lotulate, &c. 



^ Occasionally they are covered. 



3 The pollen is " ovoid ;" on three sides there 

 is a longitudinal depression, at the bottom of 

 which is a papilla : Scabio^a C>ltuiibaria, Bijsa- 

 cus .stiloistris " (H. MoHL, Ann. Sc Nat. ser. 2, 

 iii. 315). 



^ The gynaecium is in reality formed of two 

 carpellar leaves, one anterior, the other posterior, 

 at first equal and springing at the same time, 

 hut the apical portion of one becomes more or 

 less developed. 



* With a simple incomplete coat. 



