TREES AND SHRUBS. 



MISANTECA, Cham. & Schl. 



(Lauracese.) 



Misanteca, Chamisso & Schlechtendal, Linncea, vi. 367 (1831). — Nees von Esenbeck, Laur. Ex- 

 pos. 13; Syst. Laur. 272. — Meissner, Gen. 326; De Candolle Prodr. xv. pt. i. 95. — End- 

 licher, Gen. 319. — Bentham & Hooker, Gen. iii. 155. — Mez, Jahrb. Bot. Gart. Berlin, v. 

 100. — Engler & Prantl, Pflanzenfam. iii. pt. ii. 123. 

 Symphysodaphne, A. Richard, Fl. Cub. iii. 190 (1855). 



Trees with terete branchlets. Leaves alternate, entire, coriaceous, penniveined, persistent; 

 stipules wanting. Flowers perfect, minute, apetalous, on slender pedicels, in terminal or axillary 

 cymose panicles, the peduncles of the cymes and the pedicels from the axils of acuminate caducous 

 bracts and bractlets; perianth fleshy, ovoid or obovoid, six-toothed; stamens three, extrorse, 

 inserted near the middle of the perianth, united into a fleshy column furnished at the base with 

 three pairs of glands, enclosing the pistil and slightly longer than the perianth ; anthers two-celled, 

 the cells united, opening from below upward by oblong persistent lids ; ovary gradually narrowed 

 into a thick style as long as the staminal tube ; stigma capitate ; ovule solitary, suspended, anat- 

 ropous, micropyle superior. Fruit baccate, olive-shaped, surrounded at the base by the enlarged 

 ligneous capsular perianth of the flower much thickened at the margin ; pericarp thin, fleshy ; 

 endocarp thin, crustaceous ; seed filling the cavity of the fruit ; testa thin, crustaceous ; hilum 

 minute, apical ; cotyledons plano-convex, fleshy ; radicle superior, minute. 



Three species of Misanteca are known ; one, the type of the genus, 1 inhabits tropical Mexico, 

 where a second species 2 occurs, and Misanteca triandra is found in Cuba and extends into southern 

 Florida. 



The generic name is derived from the Mexican name of the tree, Palo Misanteco, at Misantla, 

 near the coast of the State of Vera Cruz, in Mexico, where the type species was discovered. 



C. S. S. 

 » Misanteca capitata, Chamisso & Schlechtendal, Linnaa, vi. 367 (1831). — Gray, Proc. Am. Acad. v. 189. — Meissner, De 

 Candolle Prodr. xv. pt. i. 96. — Hemsley, Bot. Biol. Am. Cent. iii. 71. — Mez, Jahrb. Bot. Gart. Berlin, v. 100. 

 a Misanteca Jurgensenii, Mez, Jahrb. Bot. Gart. Berlin, v. 102 (1889). 



Nectandra limbata, Meissner, De Candolle Prodr. xv. pt. i. 156 (in part, not Nees von Esenbeck) (1864). 



