PITTOSPORACEIAE. 



With the exception of the genus Pittosporum, this family is exclusively Aus- 

 tralian. It consists of 9 genera, 8 of which are peculiar to Australia. The 

 genus Pittosporum is distributed over the tropics of the old world, from tropical 

 and extra-tropical South Africa to the Hawaiian Islands, and reaches its 

 northern boundary in Japan and from there to the Canary Islands. Its position 

 in the natural system has been a varied one, as the relationship of this family 

 to other plant families has been rather a mystery. Pax, in his treatise in Engler 

 & Prantl, places it near the Hamamelidaceae, in common with which it has the 

 resin ducts. 



PITTOSPORUM Banks. 



Calyx lobes free or united at the base, petals sometimes united; stamina subulate; 

 anthers erect. Ovary sessile or shortly stipitate, incompletely 2, rarely 3-5celled. Style 

 short. Capsule often laterally compressed, with coriaceous or woody valves. Seeds smooth 

 or rugose, covered with a viscous resinous milky white pulp. Evergreen shrubs or trees, 

 glabrous or tomentose. Leaves entire or dentate, often crowded in spurious whorls. 

 Flowers in terminal or axillary racemes, panicles or clusters. 



The genus consists of more than 70 species, and is distributed from Africa 

 to the islands of the Pacific, as in Fiji, Timor, New Guinea and in the Hawaiian 

 Islands, where they have reached a wonderful development. The species are 

 dependent on the insects for pollination. The flowers of the Hawaiian species 

 are dimorphous; that is, they are of two kinds — fertile and sterile. It is very 

 difficult to render the exact limitation of each species, which is shown by the 

 fact that the writer has found capsules belonging to three diiferent species on a 

 single inflorescence, on a tree found on the island of Lanai. Hillebrand, who 

 had no mature capsules of each species, but of only a few, based his key to the 

 species on the flowers. Ten species were originally described, to which number 

 the writer has added three new ones. 



KEY TO THE SPECIES. 



Inflorescence axillary or cauline. 



Leaves glabrous; flowers white or cream-colored, the raceme pedunculate, seeds 

 smooth. 

 Flowers pedicellate. 



Sepals ovate, capsule smooth or occasionally roughened, leaves spathu- 



late to oblong lanceolate P. glabrum 



Sepals lanceolate acute or subulate, capsule rough. 



Pedicels and peduncle very long, leaves acuminate ... P. acuminatum 



Pedicels short, leaves thick dark green rounded P. spathulatum 



Flowers sessile or glomerate at the end of a long peduncle P. glomeratum 



Leaves tomentose, obtuse or acuminate, flowers subsessile or pedicellate; seeds often 

 rough at the back. 



Flowers small in a sessile cluster; capsule smooth P. terminalioides 



Flowers larger on a distinct peduncle, capsule smooth P. cauliflorum 



Flowers glomerate pedicellate, capsule very large 5 to 7 cm long, smooth 



P. Hosmerl 

 Flowers pedicellate, capsule small, rough, densely tomentose, leaves strongly 

 curved P- Gayanum 



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