PHYTOLACCACE. 47 
{ 
Ledenbergias, Petiverias, and Seguierias,! representing at most a total 
of twenty species.” 7he/ygonumis limited to the Mediterranean region; 
Barbeuia to Madagascar ; Adenogramma to Southern Africa ; Giseckia 
and Limeum to Asia and to tropical Africa. Mohlana and the 
Rivinas are common to the two Worlds, but abounding particularly in 
the New. As to the Phytolaccas there is not a warm country of the 
world where they are not represented from Mexico to Chili and from 
China to Australia. But P. octandra seems only to have been 
introduced into this last country, as has also P. decandra into the 
Mediterranean region ; this latter is considered a native of America. 

All the Phytolaccacee have characters in common; alternate, 
simple leaves ;* uniovular carpels ; ascendant ovules, with inferior, 
exterior micropyle; a non-rectilinear embryo, fornicate, uncinate, 
circinate, involute, or folded a variable number of times upon itself. 
Other characters are found among them very generally, with a very 
small number of exceptions. These are indefinite inflorescence,’ the in- 
dependence of the carpels,’ the apetalous character of the flowers,’ and 
the presence of an albumen’ within the embryo. Other more variable 
characters are, the form of the receptacle® (and consequently the mode 
of insertion), the number of the carpels, and the union or separation of 
the sexes in the same flower. Upon them are founded the following 
series, arranged by us, and easy to distinguish from each other :— 
I. Puyrouaccr®.—T wo or several carpels, quite free, or to a great 
extent (at least at a certain age), inserted on a convex receptacle. 
Stamens hypogynous. (5 genera.) 

1 Loureiro (F1. Cochinch., 341) has described, 
it is true, a S. asiatica (Moq., Prodr., 7, n. 10) ;. 
but nothing is less certain than the genus of this 
plant (see p. 38, note 2). 
2 Those of the genera Anisomeria and Peti- 
veria seem to have been multiplied without 
measure. 
3 In general they are fetid and become black 
by desiccation. 
4 There are only cymes in Giseckia, Limeum, 
Agdestis and Adenogramma. 
5 Which is only wanting in Agdestis and 
Barbeuia. 
5 The organs described as petals in cer- 
tain species of Zimewm, may have quite another 
signification. 
7 Even in Seguieria, whose embryo occupies 
by its numerous folds almost all the interior of 
the seed, there are often traces of a mucous al- 
bumen between the folds. 
8 Convex in most of the genera, quite concave 
in Agdestis, slightly hollow in most of the species 
of the genera Seguieria and Petiveria which 
show the commencement of a perigynous arrange- 
ment. 
