326 THE VEGETABLE WORLD. 
inflorescence, the same kind of male flowers, the same constant 
separation of the sexes, and a like imperfect formation of spiral 
vessels ; and both agree in having the vessels of their wood marked 
with circular disks ; a character which, if not confined to them, 1s 
uncommon elsewhere.” They are all natives of the tropics, or of 
temperate America, and the eastern part of the colony of the Cape 
of Good Hope, where they form thickets along the Caffre frontier. 
The Prvacem are noble trees or evergreen shrubs, with a 
branching trunk abounding in resin. The leaves are alternate, 
elongated, linear, and lanceolate, acicular, or pointed, 
sometimes fasciculated in two, three, or five bundles, 
each of them being a little branch with very short 
axis; when thus fasciculated the primordial leaf to 
which they are then axillary is membranous and er 
wraps them like a sheath, as in Pinus strobus, in Fig. 
369. The flowers are monecious, that is, they bear male 
and female flowers upon the same stem. The male 
flowers are composed of a floral axis, : 
inserted a considerable number of stamens having ® 
short filament, and an anther which opens from without 
in two longitudinal clefts; this anther is surmoun™ 
flowers are disposed in a catkin, and are each compos 
of an ovarium destitute of style or stigma; 
in the manner of scales, and bearing on its internal sur- 
face two suspended ovules, orthotropal, or in 
line with its axis. Fig. 370 represents the male flower W1 
8-8. an enlarged view of theanther ; Fig.371, thefemale flower — 
_ with capillary scales, showing on the right hand a pair of inverted 
ovules, hard, 
When these flowers have ripened, the scales becom 
a ligneous, and thickened at the summit into a elub-like — 
they now form the composite fruit we call a Cone, which has gv" 
a name to the family in various botanical systems. 
along which are . 
by a dilated connective like a tongue. The female — 
a straight 
- 
The oe 
represented in Fig. 372. It is formed of scale-shaped ovaries nV 
enlarged and hardened, and sometimes of bracts also, which 
occasionally obliterated, and sometimes extend beyon 
in the form of a lobed appendage. These scales finally te : 
