292 



NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 



androecium is formed of a number of stamens double that of the 

 petals, disposed in two verticils and alternating with an equal number 

 of lobes of the disk. There is one stamen within each petal which 

 envelopes it more or less in its cavity, and one in each interval 



Barraldeia integerrima. 



Fig. 264. Flower (f). 



Fig. 266. Long. sect, of flower. 



Fig. 268. Seed. Fig. 265. Diagram. Fig. 267. Fruit (f). 



Fig. 269. Long, 

 sect, of seed. 



between the petals.' Each is formed of a free filament, at first 

 incurved at the summit, and of a short bilocular introrse anther 

 dehiscing by two longitudinal clefts. The inferior ovary, the summit 

 of which only is free in some species, is surmounted by a slender 

 style the capitate extremity of which is divided into a number of 

 stigmatiferous lobes equal to that of the cells. The latter vary from 

 two to five, superposed to the petals when equal in number, and 

 enlose each two lateral descending ovules, completely or incompletely 

 anatropous, with micropyle directed upwards and outwards.^ The 

 fruit, small, coriaceous, surmounted by the remains of the calyx,^ 

 contains generally only one fertile reniform seed, the thick coats of 



^ The latter is generally a little smaller than 

 the oppositipetalous stamen. 



They have a double coat. 



As also of the stamens and style. 



