NYCTAGINACEX. 3 
part of the androceum surrounds a free, superior, unilocular ovary, 
thickened at the base into a hypogynous dise,' surmounted by a long 
slender style, the capitate apex of which bears a great number of 
small branches, simple or ramified,’ each terminated by a little head 
bearing stigmatic papilla. Towards the base of the ovary-cell, at 
the bottom of its posterior wall, is found a subbasilar placenta, which 
supports a single anatropous ovule, suberect, with the micropyle 
turned downwards and out- 
wards® The fruit is an 
achene,’ with a membranous 
pericarp surmounted by a ves- 
tige of the style, and closely 
applied to the seed which it 
encloses. Around it persists 
the inflated base of the an- 
Mirabilis Jalapa. 

droceum and the dilated 
portion of the  petaloid 
erianth, which become Bees a 
per ? 5 Induviate fruit (5). Longitudinal section, antero- 
posterior, of induviate 
dry, hard, pentagonal (figs. fruit, 
6, 7), only presenting at 
its truncated apex a narrow opening at the point where the 
tubular part is detached after anthesis. Under the very thin 
seed-coats is found a conduplicate embryo, which envelops by 
its curved radicle, with inferior apex, and by its two large 
foliaceous, unequal’ conduplicate-incumbent cotyledons, a thick 
farinaceous albumen (figs. 7, 8, 10). The Marvels of Peru are 
perennial’ plants of tropical America. ‘Their subterranean portion 
is tuberous, formed by the tap-root, which is sometimes con- 
siderably developed. The herbaceous stems di- or trichotomous, 
with swollen, articulated nodes, bear opposite, simple petiolate exsti- 
pulate leaves. The axillary or terminal flowers are in cymes or 

1 Often little developed ; its existence is always 
indisputable in the common Marvelof Peru. 
? In M. Jalapa they are only ramified, as a 
rule, into two or three short branches. 
3 It has two coats, and its base is very thick ; 
it often forms a projection below the micropyle, 
which seems to play the part of an obturator. 
4 It might almost be called a caryopsis; how- 
ever, the membranes which represent, one the 
pericarp, the other the episperm, are separable, 
although closely applied to each other. 
5 The exterior is larger than the interior, and 
this disproportion is very marked in certain 
other Nyctaginaceæ. 
6 With us, they are cultivated as annuals, the 
winter destroying their aerial branches. But 
if protected from the frost, their fleshy tap-roots 
can be preserved from one year to another. 
B 2 
