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I 



THE LOEANTHACEAE OF AUSTRALIA. Part ii. 



By W. F. Blakelt, Botanical Assistant, National Herbarium, Sydney;- ■ 



(Plates xxvii.-sssii.) 



[Read 28th June, 1922.] 



Series SANTALES Lindl. 



Subser. Loranthinea*. 



(Engler, in Engl et Prantl, Pflzfam., Nacbtr., iii., 1897, 346.) 



Family LORANTHACEAE D.Don. 



Flowers regular hermapbrodite or unisexual. Calyx usually gamopetalous, 

 wanting, when present the limb entire or toothed. Bracts usually 

 one under each flower, free or fused to the pedicel, sometimes ealyeulate. 

 Petals 2 to 6, valvate in bud, free or united into a lobed corolla inserted on the 

 summit of the ovary. Stamens as many as petals, opposite to and inserted on 

 them or in the centre of the flower; anthers sessile, versatile, or adnate, 2-oelled, 

 opening by pores or longitudinally. Disc usually present though not conspicuous, 

 annular, or somewhat pentagonal. Ovary inferior, 1-oelled, with 1 erect or semi- 

 erect ovule. Style simple; stigTaa small, awl-shaped, or more frequently sub- 

 capitate. Fruit baccate or tripterous, crowned by the small disc and the per- 

 sistent calyx lobes or petals, one-seeded, the seed adherent to the pulp of the 

 pericarp, and surrounded by viscin, endosperm albuminous. Embryo elavate or 

 cylindrical, the radicle superior, cotyledons 2-5, often remaining within the endo- 

 sperm when germination takes place. Shrubs or trees with brittle, jointed 

 branches, parasitic on the branches and roots of other plants. Leaves simple 

 entire, with "stone cells all through the mesophyll; these are often star-shaped 

 with long slender arms," * opposite or alternate, usually thick and coriaceous, 

 tri- or quinque-nerved, or penninerved, sometimes reduced to minute scales or 

 wanting, when absent the branches markedly compressed and viridulus. Stipules 

 when present, small and persistent. Inflorescence cymose, racemose, capitate or 

 fascicled; flowers conspicuous or minute, highly coloured or pale green. 



"The only internal secretory organs found in this Order axe mueilage-canals, 

 which occur in Nuytsia florihimda R.Br. They appear in the pith and in the 

 later stages in the bast; the pith contains a central mueilage-canal, and others 



* A. G, Hamilton in Brit. A.ss. Adv. of Sci., N.S.W. Handb. 1914, 402. 



