292 



PHANEROGAMIA. 



a line or a line and a half long, subtended by a minute bract, articu- 

 lated in the middle. Calyx five^parted, persistent, externally slightly 

 paberuletit ; the lobes ovate-lanceolate, thickish, rather acute, imbri- 

 cated in aestivation. Petals 5, triangidar-ovate, acute, greenish- white, 

 sessile by a broad base, inserted under the entire margin of the orbicular, 

 flat, or somewhat concave, perigynous dish, which fills the bottom of 

 the calyx and surrounds the base of the ovary; they are decidedly 

 imbricated in aestivation, scarcely exceeding the calyx, plane, obscurely 

 one-nerved, their thin margins ciliate, persistent. Stamens 5, inserted 

 on the margin of the disk, alternate with the petals : filaments in the 

 male flowers filiform and twice the length of the petals ; in the female 

 flowers very short (about half the length of the petals), persistent: 

 anthers didymous, incumbent, fixed near the middle, destitute of a 

 manifest connective, two-celled, pointless; the ovoid cells opening longi- 

 tudinally; those of the fertile flowers smaller and scarcely pollini- 

 ferous. Ovary free, ovoid, in the male flowers abortive and sterile; in 

 the fertile flowers two-celled ; the style very short and thick, terminated 

 by a spreading hvo-lobed stigma. Ovules 2 in each cell, collateral, 

 obovoid-globose, anatrojxms, erect from the base of the cell, where they 

 are inserted on a placental projection from the axis, so that their oppo- 

 site and very thick rhaphes become nearly dorsal, as respects the axis 

 of the ovary. The fruit, not perfectly mature, appears to be a 

 rather dry berry, depressed -globose, slightly 2-4-lobed, according to 

 the number of seeds perfected ; in the specimens scarcely exceeding a 

 line in diameter, stipate at the base by the persistent calyx, corolla, 

 &c, two-celled; the cells two-seeded, or by abortion one-seeded. Seeds 

 obovoid, oblique, large for the size of the fruit, with a short and 

 caruncle-like rhaphe, which is exterior or dorsal: the thick and crus- 

 taceous testa sculptured ivith numerous transverse ribs and grooves. 

 Arillus none. The testa, although plump and well-formed, is empty 

 in all the numerous seeds examined : so that the characters of the 

 albumen, if there be any, and of the embryo, are unknown. 



The general characters of this plant so nearly accord with those of 

 Perrotteiia Quinduensis that I refer it, without much hesitation, to 

 that little-known genus. Since it is obvious from Kunth's figures, 

 that what he doubtfully terms pyrence or ossicida are seeds, there 

 remains no important generic difference between that plant and our 

 own, except the aestivation of the petals; which in the latter are 



