Gray on the genus Buckleya. 99 
are so inconspicuous that they have until now escaped my notice 
at the proper season for examining them. 
The point of principal consequence is that the female flowers 
prove to have a double perigonium; one, moreover, in which the 
exterior or “‘accessory calyculus,” far from being minute or rudi- 
mentary, is much more couspicuous than the inner, being of more 
than twice its length! The divisions of this accessory perigonium 
are regularly alternate with the inner or normal perigonium of the 
amily, that which is opposed to the stamens, and which mani- 
festly answers to the single floral envelope in the allied Pyrularia. 
ut they so perfectly resemble the leaves in shape and texture, 
‘(although narrower as well as smaller,) as also in vernation, ex- 
panding with the leaves some days before the inner perigonium 
Opens, that they do not perhaps suggest much argument, in addi- 
tion to what is already furnished by Olacinee and Loranthus, for 
changing the generally received view of the nature of the flora 
covering in Santalacee. Their foliaceous nature is further evinced 
by their distinct articulation with the summit of the calyx-tube. 
These long and narrow lobes are the “ perigonium” of Dr. Tor- 
rey’s character of the genus, at least of the female flowers; the 
Proper perigonium having probably fallen in the specimens he 
examined, although it is by no means very deciduous. I have 
not seen the male flowers. — - 
Plant whose floral envelopes (at least in the male flowers) 
distinctly double, and the inner series imbricated in estivation, 
¢ ; the more so as it is said 
in the published character to have a uniovulate ovary. ‘This 
character, however, may have been merely inferred from the soli- 
of the inner perigonium that the female flowers examined were 
ian advanced state. A dissection of the unimpregnated flowers 
1 the living plant brings to view in B the ordinary struc 
