I. PLANTiE FRiMONTIAN^. 9 



Leaves crowded toward the summit of short, spur-like branches, which often 

 become spiny, appearing fasciculate, but truly opposite. They are oblong, on very 

 short pedicles, from five to eight lines long, rather obtuse, tapering at the base, 

 very thick and coriaceous, marked with five longitudinal ribs on the upper surface, 

 but flattisli underneath, clothed with appressed hairs, wliich are fixed by the middle. 

 The stipules are minute and scale-like, partly adherent to the short and persistent 

 petiole, from which the lamina of the leaf falls away, their minute points giving 

 to the spurs a squarrose appearance. The flowers are abifut half an inch in 

 diameter, terminal, solitary, on short stalks, and are subtended by two (or some- 

 times four) trifid bracts which resemble tlie ordinary leaves, except that the points 

 of the stipules are more strongly produced, and the articulated lamina is much 

 smaller. The persistent sepals are ovate or obovate, coriaceous, somewhat united 

 at the base, obtuse or mucronate at the summit, spreading, one or more of them 

 rarely furnished with a single lateral tooth. Externally they are hairy like the 

 leaves, but glabrous and yellowish on the inner surface ; the two outer are flat, 

 the two inner obvolute or half equitant. There are from thirty to forty stamens, 

 which are about as long as the calyx : the filaments slender, distinct, except at the 

 base, where they are confluent with a singular sheath which encloses the pistil : 

 anthers oblong-cordate, introrse, two-celled, opening longitudinally. Pollen very 

 minute, obtusely triangular. The sheath arises from the base of the calyx, and is 

 about the length of the stamens. It gradually tapers from below upwards, and is 

 somewhat five-toothed at the summit. The pistil is solitary and simple; the ovary 

 sessile and oblong : style lateral, arising from a little below the middle of the 

 ovary, tortuous, exserted, very villous, the upper third compressed, somewhat 

 recurved, and stigmatose on one side. Ovule single in all the specimens examined, 

 hemitropous on a very short funiculus, which is inserted opposite the origin of the 

 style. Ripe fruit unknown : probably an achenium. In a partially mature state 

 the seed appeared to be destitute of albumen, and the broad flat cotyledons could 

 be distinctly seen. The radicle is erect. 



It is difficult to refer this puzzling genus with certainty to any natural order 

 hitherto indicated. Its nearest affinities are doubtless with Rosacese, and with the 

 suborder ChrysobalaneaB ; from which it differs in its opposite leaves, persistent 

 stipules, lateral stigma, and solitary ovules, as well as in habit. One undoubted 

 genus of this suborder, and three anomalojis genera referred here by most 

 botanists, are apetalous. In several others, the filaments are united at the base ; 

 in two or three there are lateral or interior sterile filaments ; and in Trilepisium 

 there is a tube between stamens and pistils, as well as a solitary ovule. The 

 sheath or tube may be regarded as belonging to the androecium either by the 

 deduplication of the interior stamens, or as consisting of the monadelphous fila- 

 ments of an abortive inner series of stamens. 



Coleogyne also resembles some of the proper Rosaces with solitary carpels ; 

 especially those of the Tribe Dryadese, Ton: ^ Gr. In its elongated lateral 

 stigma, it is like Purshia. To Cliflfortia, it is allied in its foHage and stipules, as well 

 as in other respects. Finally, we are inclined to place this new genus in Rosacese, 

 between Chrysobalaneee and Dryadese ; although it is more nearly related to the 



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