SAPINDAOE^E. 309 



thick coriaceous and glabrous testa. The majority of the species of 

 jEf^ctdus have a tube-sliaped calyx, petals very unlike each other, two 

 especially, with slender and long claw, being spathulato or coch- 

 leate, and a fruit usually smooth ; the genus Pavia ' has been made 

 of them, which we only preserve here as a section, the same as 

 Macrothijrsus" and Calothyrsus,^ genera proposed for the species of 

 jEscuIus with tubular calyx, bilabiate or nearly so in the latter, 

 which has the claws of the petals flattened, while they are canali- 

 culate in the former, remarkable, moreover, by the arched staminal 

 filaments. So constituted, the genus yEscuhis contains twelve to 

 fifteen species,* beautiful trees or shrubs from North America and 

 temperate Asia, having opposite, compound-digitate leaves, with 5-9 

 denticulate folioles, and flowers (white, pink, or yellow) arranged 

 in ramified terminal clusters, composed of cymes, usually uni- 

 parous. 



The species of BUlia^' shrubs from Mexico and Columbia, have 

 been sometimes joined to JEscuhis^ having opposite digitate leaves gene- 

 rally with three folioles, but distinguished from it, it is said, by the 

 petals being provided with a bilobate appendage. This is the case 

 in one of the species of the genus inhabiting Columbia; but the 

 character is of little value, for it disappears in the other species, 

 otherwise very analogous, native of Mexico, and only exhibiting a 

 slight interior thickening of the claw of the petals. Nevertheless, 

 Billia might, strictly, be preserved as a distinct genus, because the 

 disk is excentric and unilateral, and the unequal distinctly imbricate 

 sepals are almost completely free. 



VI. MELIANTHUS SERIES. 



The honey-flowers^ (fig. 409-41.3) have hermaphrodite and irre- 

 gular flowers. The very unequal receptacle is prolonged backwards 



1 BOERH. Hort. Lugd.-Bat. 260.— Pom. Diet. Fr. i. Z23.—£ot. Mag. t. 2118, 5017, 5117.— 

 V. 93.— TuEP. Diet. So. Nat. Atl. t. 165, 166.— Walp. Sep. i. 423 ; Ann. ii. 226 ; iv. 381 ; vii. 

 Spach, Aim. Sc. Nat. set. 2, ii. 52; Suit, à Buffon, 624. 



iii. 18. s Peyk. Bnt. Zdt. (1858), 153.— Tr. et Pl. 



2 Spach, ^««. Sc. Nat. sér. 2, ii. 61. Ann. Sc. Nut. sér. 4, xviii. 366.— Walp. Aiiit. 

 2 Spach, loc. cit. 62. vii. 624.— Putzei/sia Pl. et Lind. Cat. (1857). 



* Keichb. Ic. Fl. Gnm. v. 1. 161.— jAcauEM. « Melianthm T. Inst. 430, t. 245.— L. Gen. n. 



Votj. J3o(. t. 35.— A. Gray, Man. ed. 5, 117.— 795.— Adans. Fnm. d,s. Pl. ii. 388.— J. Gen. 



Boies. Fl. Or. i. 946. — Guen. et Godk. Fl. de 795, — Lamk. ///. t. 552. — Desrous.s. Diet. iv. 



VOL. V. 3 J5 



