208 NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



in its thickness by oleaginous and resiniferous channels, and 

 enclosing in its cavity a seed with slight albumen, surrounding an 

 embryo having flat cotyledons and a superior radicle. The funicle 

 which supports the ovule of Schiniis detaches itself from the 

 wall of the ovary at a variable height, sometimes towards the base 

 of the cell, and sometimes not far from its summit ; the ovule and, 

 therefore, the seed are then more or less ascendent or descendent, 

 without the micropyle ceasing to be superior ; and we insist on this 

 fact, that great importance should not be allowed it in the com- 

 parison among themselves of the other genera of this series. Fifteen 

 species of Schinus have been admitted, all natives of the warm and 

 temperate regions of America.^ They are odoriferous trees and 

 shrubs, with alternate leaves, imparipinnate or sometimes simple, 

 as occurs in Duvava, usually distinguished as a distinct genus. 

 These last have the flowers collected in axillary spikes, solitary or 

 fasciculate, whilst in Schinus i^roper,^ they form, in the axils of 

 the leaves and at the summit of the branches, ramified clusters 

 of cymes. 



Sorindeia has very nearly the flower of Schinus, but with valvate 

 petals. The stamens are either equal in number to the petals (the 

 rule in the female flowers where they remain sterile) or two to four 

 times more numerous. The unilocular ovary is surmounted by a 

 style with three stigmatiferous branches, and contains a single ovule, 

 with superior micropyle supported by a funicle, basilar or united, 

 sometimes in a very slight degree with the inferior part of the ovary 

 wall, sometimes for a very considerable length and not detaching itself 

 until at or above the middle of its height. This occui's in 3Iauria, 

 consisting of American trees, with simple or compound pinnate leaves, 

 inseparable however generically from Sorindeia proper, formed of 

 species with pinnate leaves, from the tropical regions of the old world, 

 and in which the funicle is free or united to the wall of the ovary 

 for a slight distance. Solenocarpus indicus, an Asiatic tree, has the 

 pentamerous flowers of Sorindeia, with an isostemonous andi'oceum, 

 a drupe obliquely oblong, and an embryo with linear cotyledons 

 and compound pinnate leaves ; but its unilocular ovary is sui'mounted 

 by a simple clavate style, having its stigmatiferous summit obliquely 

 truncate ; this character seems to have only a secondary value here. 



' Cav. Icon. t. 239 {Amt/ris).—C. Gay, Fl. Hook, in Bot. Mag. t. 3339.— Walp. Rep. i. 



Chil. ii. 41 {Duvaua).—TR. et Pl. in Arm Sc. 550; v. 413; Ann. \n. 647 [Duvaua). 



Nat. sér. 6, xiv. 289. — Andr. in Hot. Kepos. t. 2 Sect. Euschinus March, loc. cit. 166. 

 629.— LnjDL. in Bot. Eeg. t. 1568, 1673, 1680.— 



