NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



inwards, oftener on the margin, or oven a little outwards. 1 

 Between them rise, more or less, the alternate lobes of the disk, in 

 the centre of which, more or less depressed, the gyna3cium is 

 inserted. This is composed of an ovary of 3-5 cells, superposed to 

 the petals when equal in number, and surmounted by a longer or 

 shorter style, with 3-5 lobed stigmatiferous extremity. In the com- 

 mon Euonymus [Euonymus europœus) and in many other species, 2 the 



Euonymus verrucosus. 



Fig. 4. Diagram. Fig. 5. Longitudinal section of flower. 



placenta, which is in the internal angle of each cell, supports, at its base, 

 two ascending anatropal ovules, with micropyle directed downwards 

 and outwards. 3 The fruit is a four-angled capsule, depressed at the 

 summit, one or more of the cells of which, dehiscing along their 

 dorsal suture, contain one or more, rarely two, seeds enveloped in a 

 fleshy and coloured aril, 1, and enclosing under their coats a fleshy 

 albumen, the axis of which is occupied by an embryo (often green), 

 with an inferior cylindro-conical radical, and large foliaceous 

 cotyledons. 



The form of the floral receptacle, the height of the disk, and, 

 consequently, the point of insertion of the stamens, vary in different 

 species of Euonymus. There are species in which the two ovules of 

 each cell, instead of ascending, descend, and then the direction of 

 the micropyle is upwards and inwards 5 ; in others, again, the ovules 

 are horizontal, or nearly so. 6 E. nitidus and nanus have four ascend- 

 ing ovules in each cell, disposed in two vertical series. E. americanus 



1 They are extrorse in the young flowers of 

 E. Europœus. In E. Ittcidus, it may be said that 

 the younger the anther, the more introrse it is. 

 This can he seen clearly in E.fimbrintus, Lopho- 

 pctalum, etc. The pollen is generally " ovoid ; 

 three-fold ; in water, spherical with thrco 

 bands and papilla?," H. Mohl. Ann. Sc. Nat. 

 sor. 2, iii. 338), the same in Celastrus, where 

 it may have " an oxternal finely cellulose mem- 

 brane." 



2 E. verrucosus, atropurpureus, etc. 



3 A double coat. 



4 Springing primarily from the micropyle, 

 and may extend more or less round the umbi- 

 licus, even to its entiro circumference. 



3 E. japonicus, lucidus, echinatus, latifolius, 

 6 See H. Bn. Rec/i. sur les Ovules des Euony- 

 mus cultivés à Paris (in Bull Soc. Rot. de Fr. v 

 256, 314). 



