72 MENISPERMACE.E. 



Frutescent or woody vines ; with usually twining stems ; 

 tlic leaves alternate, petiolcd, exstipulate, palmately 3 — 7- 

 veined, rounded, entire Or obscurely lobcd. Flowers small, 

 greenish-white or purplish, in axillary or supra-axillary race- 

 mose panicles. Bracts minute. 



Etymology. From the Cocculus Indicus of the shops, an old name (form- 

 ed from coccum, a berry) adopted by Bauhin. But the plant that yield;- the 

 officinal fruit which gave its name to the genus, as now received, has unfor- 

 tunately been excluded from it, and forms the genus Anamirta. 



Observations. The essential character given above has been made to 

 conform to the genus as received by Colebrooke. The English description 

 is drawn wholly from our own plant; which seems, however, to be truly 

 congeneric with several Indian species, as it probably is with South Ameri- 

 can ones : but I have not seen the illustration of Chondodendron convolvula- 

 ceum, Pbpp. It is a pity that the name of Cocculus was not kept for the 

 plant yielding the officinal fruit so called ; in which case, one of the names 

 applied to American species, cited above, would have taken due precedence 

 for the present genus, whither it were found to embrace the bulk of those of 

 the Old World or not. At all events, it will doubtless comprise none which 

 present the character " cotyledones distantes," assigned by Be Candolle ; 

 although apparently it should include C. sepium, Cokbr., with foliaceous 

 cotyledons, as well as C. Plukenetii, DC, with fleshy and semicyhndrical 

 ones. 



PLATE 28. Cocculus Carolinus, DC. ; — branch of the sterile plant, 

 natural size, from the Botanic Garden, Cambridge. 



1. Diagram of the aestivation of the staminate flower. 



2. Staminate flower, enlarged. 



3. An outer sepal, and 4, an inner sepal, from the same. 

 5. A petal, and 6, a stamen, from the same. 



7. A petal, with the stamen, enlarged ; anther dehiscent. 



8. Stamen, enlarged; the anther divided transversely before dehiscence. 



9. Pistillate flower, enlarged. 



10. A pistil, magnified ; the ovary divided longitudinally. 



11. Drupes from a single flower, with a lobcd leaf, &c. ; natural size. 



12. Vertical section of a drupe and the inclosed seed and embryo ; enlarged. 



13. Putamen (the sarcocarp removed), enlarged. 



14. Seed extracted, enlarged. 



15. Embryo extracted, enlarged ; showing the slender cotyledons, &c. 



