1896.] G. King— Materials for a Flora of the Malayan Peninsula. 459 



even ill bud, under i in. long. Bracteoles two, unequal, ovate, acute, 

 pubesccut ; pedicel of flower very short. Sepals 5, ovate, blunt, concave^ 

 erect, shortly ciliolate at the edges. Petals and stamens absent. Ovarij 

 broadly ovoid, tomentose; style thick, conical, glabrescent. Fmit unknown. 

 Singapore : Ridley, No. 6342. 



The only specimens of this are in flower ; and, the ovaries having 

 been fertilised, the petals and stamens (as is the case in other species of 

 Meliosma) have fallen off. The only specimens known are Mr. Ridley't^. 

 They were collected in the little patch of forest which forms an adjunct 

 to the Botanic Garden of Singapore, which is one of the few pieces 

 of the original vegetation of the island which have escaped the rava^^es 

 of axe and spade. In leaf this plant is not unlike M. lanceolata, Bl. but 

 the nervation and pubescence of the leaflets are different. 



Note. — Besides the foregoing, there are in the Calcutta Herbarium specimens 

 from Singapore (Herb. Ridley, without a number) of a pinnate-leaved Meliosma. 

 None of these are in fruit, but there are plenty of flowers, and these closely resemble 

 the flowers of M. lanceolata, Bl. The leaflets of this plant are narrowly ob]on'>" of 

 rather thinner texture than those of if. lanceolat't, and their upper surfaces are not 

 glabrous (except the pubescent midrib), and they are not at all rugulose j the under 

 surfaces are densely covered with unequally long shining hairs. 



Nat. Ord. XXXVI, Anacardiaceae. 



Trees or shrubs usually with oleo-resinous often acrid juice. Leaves 

 alternate ('opposite in Bouea), simple or compound. Flowers small, reo-u- 

 lar, unisexual, polygamous, sometimes hermaphrodite, usually in panicles, 

 the ultimate branchlets being cymose. Calyx 3-5-partite, sometimes 

 accrescent (spathaceous in Gluta, calyptrate in Melanorrhoea) . Petals 

 3 to 5, alternate with the segments of the calyx, free, imbricate or 

 valvate in bud, sometimes accrescent, rarely absent. Disc flat, cupular 

 or annular, entire or lobed, rarely obsolete. Stamens equal in number 

 to the petals, or fewer, or more numerous, often abortive, inserted beneath 

 the disc, rarely t)n it : filaments often subulate ; the anthers 2-celled, 

 basi- or dorsi-fixed. Pistil in the male flower usually absent, in the 

 female solitary, or pistils 4 or 6 and apocarpous, or 2 to 5 and syucar- 

 pous: ovary mostly superior (half-inferior in Holigarna) the loculi with 

 a single ovule pendulous from the top of the cell or from its side, or 

 from an ascending funicle rising from the base : styles 1 to 5 and free, or 

 the stigma sub-sessile, or simple or lobed. Frtdt superior (except in Holi- 

 garna and Brimycarpus) and drup'kceous, with one cell and one seed, and 

 sometimes with accrescent sepals or petals ; or a false drupe with a 2- to 5- 

 celled stone covered by pulp. Seed exalbuminous : the embryo straight 

 or curved : cotyledons plano-convex, radicle short. — Distkib. chiefly 

 tropical ; about 430 species in 55 genera. 



