or obscure specie:: of Plants. 54.9 



to, which appears to me neither to agree with the character given, 

 nor to differ from Arundo of Kunth.) 



Sph^erocarya, Wall. 

 Ahout six years ago, Dr Wight and I, while examining some of 

 his East Indian plants which were in an imperfect state, found 

 specimens of a pear-shaped fruit accompanied with some detached 

 leaves, which we considered to belong to Sphmrocctrya. These we 

 soon afterwards noticed in Jameson's Edinburgh Journal (for July 

 1832,) under the name of S. Walliehiana ; we had seen no flowers, 

 but from the remains of them on the top of the fruit, we were in- 

 duced to alter considerably the character of the genus, in so far as 

 we conceived it to have no petals, but that the bodies so called by 

 Dr Wallich were an exterior petaloid row of glands. Whether we 

 were correct in ascribing this structure to the Nepal plant, the 

 type of the genus, I have never been able to determine, not having 

 been so fortunate as possess or even see specimens of it, but having 

 now obtained flowers belonging to the peninsular species, I find 

 that it must be separated from Dr Wallich's genus. In the Nepal 

 plant there are said to be five persistent petals and alternating 

 scales, (or perhaps a double row of scales, the outer petaloid, the 

 inner minute,) and no disk ; in Dr Wight's there is a disk, but 

 neither petals nor scales. Dr Wallich says, that the ovule is '•' erect, 

 supported by a fleshy subdiaphanous spirally twisted cord, which 

 rises from the bottom of the ovary, and is conducted into the oblong- 

 cell by means of a proper tube or canal ;" on which account Sphce- 

 rocarya would be a doubtful member of Santalaceas, (if the sup- 

 posed erect ovule and fleshy cord be not in reality a more central 

 column,) while the peninsular plant belongs, \ should suppose, un- 

 questionably to that order. I propose to call it 



Scxeropyrum, (Santalacese.) 

 Flores abortu dioici ? Masc. Perianthium ebracteolatum, 5-fi- 

 dum, laciniis patentibus : tubus turbinatus, intus disco cupulato 

 5-lobo tectus. Petala nulla. Stamina 5, sepalis opposita, inter 

 disci marginem perianthiumque inserta. Filament a planiuscula, 

 sepalis paullo breviora, apice bifida, segmento utroque antheras lo- 

 culum antice ferente. Ovarium (abortivum ?) disco immersum, 

 uniloculare, (nunc fere solidum,) columella centrali carnosa cylin- 

 drica e basi loculi orta apice libera instructum. Stylus conicus 

 crassus. Stigma 3-4-lobum, lobis erectis inaequalibus, duobus ma- 

 joribus. Fem. Flores (fide Rheidei) ut in mare at tubo pyriformi. 



