134 NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. 
dilated at the apex,’ bears a calycine perianth and an androceum 
below the unicarpellary gyneceum. The calyx consists of four 
sepals, two lateral, one anterior, and one posterior. This last is 
usually the broadest, really representing two calycine leaves, traces 
of which are sometimes to be found in its more or less deeply notched 
apex.’ The prefloration is variably imbricate, the sepals overlapping 
Copaifera officinalis. 
Fie. 124. Fig. 125. 
Flower (2). Longitudinal section of flower. 
Fig. 126. Fre. 127. Fie. 128. 
Fruit (3). Longitudinal section of fruit. Embryo (3). 
greatly when the edges thin off slowly, and scarcely imbricated when 
the edges are thick and only abruptly bevelled (fig. 124). The 
stamens are in two tetra- or pentamerous whorls; the longer are 
superposed to the sepals, and when there are five, it is through 
two being in front of the posterior sepal. The shorter ones alternate 
1 In C. officinalis we have been able to make short cupule of glandular tissue surrounding the 
out in the fresh flower that within the insertion foot of the gynaceum. 
of the perianth and androceum there is a very 2 Here and therewe finda calyx with five leaves, 
or even, though very rarely, with only three. 
