SAMYDACEil. 81 



§2. MELISTAURUM. (MeUstaurum, Forst.)— Stamina fertilia 10. Stigma suh- 

 sessile, crassum. Ovula in placentis pauca. 



5. Casearia disticha. (Tab. 5.) 



C. foliis oblongis seu ovali-oblongis memhranaceis crebre punctaiis brevis- 

 sime petiolatis ; floribus e gemma axlllari pluribios parvis subsessilibus ; 

 filamentis fertilibus glabris; stlgmate integerrimo. 



MeUstaurum distiehum, Forst. Char. Gen. p. 143, t. 72 ? ideo 

 Samyda polyand ra, Willd. Spec. PI. 2, p. 626? et 

 Casearia MeUstaurum, DC. Prodr. 2, p. 51 ? 



Hab. Sandal-wood Bay, Vanua-levu, one of the Feejee Islands. 



A tree or shrub (its size not recorded), glabrous throughout, with 

 flexuous branches. Leaves oblong, or oval-oblong, the lower inclining 

 to ovate, acutish or obtusely acuminate, membranaceous, entire, 

 thickly punctate with round and oblong pellucid dots, from 3 to 5 

 inches long, on petioles of about 2 lines in length : the leaves are dis- 

 tichously arranged. Stipules very minute. Flowers very small 

 (barely a line in length), crowded in a sessile axillary glomerule or 

 capitulum, on very short pedicels, subtended by minute scaly bractlets. 

 Sepals 5, obovate, longer than the stamens. Stamens monadelphous 

 at the base : fertile ones 10, in two ranks, the five exterior shorter : 

 their filaments subulate and glabrous: anthers didymous. Sterile 

 filaments 10, interior, subulate, nearly equalling the shorter fertile 

 series, villous-bearded. Ovary conoidal, glabrous, one-celled, with 

 3 parietal placentae, each bearing 4 to 6 ovules in two series. Style 

 none, or a mere contraction at the apex of the ovary. Stigma thick, 

 depressed-capitate, entire. Fruit not seen.— In one specimen nearly 

 all the flowers are in an abnormal or diseased state ; when they are 

 enlarged, and the deformed sterile filaments are exserted in the form 

 of horns or callous processes. The larger flowers of the specimen 

 figured are more or less thus affected. 



*o x 



This plant is, I suspect, not specifically different from Forster's 

 MeUstaurum distiehum, from New Caledonia, of which only the generic 



