8 Structure of the 



new species resembled H. Gouldi, but with seventeen and 

 nineteen rows of scales where the other had fifteen. The true 

 " Black Snake/' Pseudechys porphyraicus, as well as the 

 Murray, Brown, Pseudechys were exhibited, and their charac- 

 ters 'discussed. Only one species of Diemensia, the D. 

 reticulata, was noticed ; it was common in the Murray 

 district. 



Art. V. — On the Structure of the Floiver of the Mignionette. 

 By Thomas S. Ralph, Esq., M.R.C.S. 



[Read 8th July, 1861.] 



The flower of the Mignionette is remarkable for the 

 curious one-sided appearance it presents when viewed on the 

 supporting flower-stalk. A closer examination shows us 

 that the centre of it, or ovary (the seed-bearing part), is 

 really on one side, and if we denude the flower of all its 

 parts, save the stamens, we find this appearance is due to the 

 stamens and ovary being placed on a thickened scale or part, 

 termed disk, which is itself on one side. 



Outside of this thick gTeen pad or scale, we find similar 

 large green scales, like bodies fringed with white fringes, 

 and to the eye of the observer appearing to answer to the 

 character of petals. Of these organs, there are four plainly 

 seen, two being larger ; there are, however, two more minute 

 ones, each furnished with only one strap-like fringe, and 

 placed hidden away under the bundle of stamens. All these 

 parts are in turn surrounded by six sepals, which together 

 constitute the calyx or flower cup. 



Dr. Lindley, in his work entitled " Vegetable Kingdom," 

 thus describes the flower : — " Calyx, many parted ; petals, 

 broad plates having lacerated appendages at the back, 

 unequal ; disk (hypogynous) one sided, glandular ; stamens, 

 definite, inserted into the disk, &c ; ovary, sessile, three 

 lobed." (Page 356.) " The flowers," he says, " of these 

 plants, of which the common mignionette may be taken as 

 a t} T pe, differ in many respects from those of other orders, 

 especially in the presence of a -very large glandular one-sided 

 plate, out of which the stamens grow, and in the petals 

 bearing a great resemblance to that disk. This led me in 

 the Collectanea Botanica, and in the first edition of this 

 work, to describe the structure of the Weldworts as con- 



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