CEPHALOTAXUS 



Cephalotaxus, Siebold and Zuccarini, ex Endlicher, Gen. Suppl. ii. 27 (1842); Bentham et Hooker, 

 Gen. PI. iii. 430 (1880); Masters, in Journ. Linn. Soc. {Bot.) xxx. 4 (1893), and in Gard. 

 Chron. xxxiii. 227 (1903); Worsdell, in Ann. Bot. xv. 637 (1901); Pilger, in Engler, 

 Pflanzenreich, iv. 5, TaxacecB, 99 (1903). 



Evergreen shrubs or small trees, belonging to the order Taxaceae, with 

 opposite or whorled branches. Young branchlets green, marked by white stomatic 

 dots, and with linear pulvini, separated by slight grooves. Buds, with numerous 

 imbricated scales, which persist as a conspicuous sheath at the apex of the 

 branchlet of the second year. Leaves spirally arranged, radially spreading on 

 vertical shoots, but on lateral branches thrown by twisting of their bases into a 

 pectinate arrangement ; persistent three or four years, very shortly stalked, linear, 

 acute at the apex ; upper surface green with a prominent midrib in a depression ; 

 lower surface with two whitish broad bands, composed of numerous stomatic lines, 

 separated by a narrow raised green midrib, and bounded on each outer side by 

 a very narrow marginal green band ; fibro-vascular bundle undivided, with a single 

 resin-canal beneath it. 



Flowers dioecious.^ Staminate flowers in globose heads, which are solitary in 

 the axils of the leaves of the branchlets of the previous year ; each head with six 

 to eleven flowers, each of which is subtended by a bract and has seven to twelve 

 stamens ; pollen-sacs two or three, dehiscing longitudinally.^ Pistillate heads fewi 

 each solitary in the axil of a scale-leaf near the base of the branchlet of the current 

 year, and composed of a stipitate axis, towards the end of which are three or four 

 decussate pairs of opposite bracts ; each bract is cup-shaped at the base and bears 

 two erect ovules side by side. Usually only one or two of the ovules in a head 

 develops, forming a drupe-like seed, with a fleshly outer covering, and an inner 

 hard woody shell, which encloses the albumen and embryo. The seedling* has 

 two long linear cotyledons, immediately above which and decussate with them on 

 the stem is a pair of primary leaves, which are followed at intervals by either whorls 

 or pairs of larger leaves. 



Six species* of Cephalotaxus are known, one of which is possibly a hybrid, 



1 In rare cases, the flowers are monoecious, as in a shrub of C. Fortuni, described by Carriere in Reo. Hort. 1878, 

 p. 116, fig. 24. 



2 Kemer, Nat. Hist. Plants, Eng. Trans, ii. 124 (1898), states that the anthers open and shut periodically. 

 ' Cf. Masters, va. Journ. Linn. Soc. {Bot.) xxvii. 241 (1889). 



* C. Mannii, Hooker, native of the Khasi Mountains ; C. Griffitkii, Hooker, of Assam and Manipur ; and 

 C. Oliveri, Masters, of Central China, are not now in cultivation. The plants of C. Griffitkii, formerly in the temperate 

 house at Kew, mentioned by Hooker, Fl. Brit. India, v. 648 (1890), died many years ago. The young plants at Coombe 

 Wood, referred to C. Oliveri in Gard. Chron. xxxiii. 227 (1903), and Hortus Veitchii, 338 (1906), are C. drupacea. 



Podocarpus argotania, Hance, a peculiar conifer in southern China, is referred to Cephalotaxus by Pilger ; but is distinct. 



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