CXI. PROTEACEAE. 
1817 
tut in some genera variously united or reduced in number or wholly 
deficient. Ovary 1-celled, sessile or stipitate, more or less excentric-al, with a 
single terminal undivided style, variously shaped at the end, with a small 
terminal oblique or lateral stigma. Ovules either solitary, or 2 collaterally 
-attached or slightly superposed, or several imbricate in 2 contiguous rows, 
either pendulous and orthotropous, or more frequently laterally attached and 
more or less amphitropous, rarely erect and anatropous, the micropvle always 
inferior and frequently prominent from the incomplete development of the 
primine. Fruit either an indehiscent nut or drupe, or a more or less 
dehiscent coriaceous or woody follicle, very rarely a completely 2-valved 
capsule ; either 1-celled and 1 -seeded, or when 2 seeds are ripened in a drupe 
sometimes really 2-celled from the growth of the endocarp between as well 
■as round the seeds, or when 2 or more seeds ripen in a follicle, apparently 
2 or more celled by the consolidation of the external coating of the 2 
adjoining seeds into a membranous or woody plate detaching itself from 
the remainder of the seed. Seeds without albumen, the testa usually thin, 
rarely coriaceous or hard ; embryo straight, with fleshy cotyledons and a 
short inferior radicle. — Shrubs or trees, rarely undershrubs or even perennial 
herbs. Leaves alternate or scattered, in a very few genera strictly opposite 
or verticillate, but often crowded under the inflorescence so as to appear 
verticillate, usually coriaceous, often vertical with stomata on both side, 
or in the same genera horizontal or narrow and terete, either toothed or 
variously divided, without stipules. Flowers axillary or terminal, solitary 
or in racemes or spikes, often condensed into umbels heads or cones, each 
flower or pair of flowers subtended by a bract, very deciduous in some genera 
and perhaps sometimes really deficient, the pedicels always without bracteoles. 
Proteaceae, with their chief seat in Australia and South Africa, extend on the one hand to 
New Caledonia, the Indian Archipelago, and tropical Asia, chiefly eastern, to Japan, and on the 
other to South America. 
The clavate fusiform or disk-shaped end of the style in Proteaceae is usually described as the 
stigma, and where it is more or less constricted it is said to be articulate, but I have never found 
any real articulation, and although the thickened style-end may be an essential aid in the 
-collection or desimination of the pollen, its surface is not stigmatic, the real stigma being usually 
very small, either on the point terminating the style-end, or in the centre of the disk, or quite 
lateral. The diversified mode in which the different genera the conformation of this style-end 
and its relation to the anthers promotes the dissemination of pollen whilst it impedes self- 
fertilization, upon which I have drawn up a few notes from the Linnean Society founded on the 
examination of dried specimens, would be an interesting study for local botanists who have the 
means of examining and watching the plants living in their native stations. — Benth. 
In the distribution of the numerous species of this most natural Order into tribes, genera, and 
sections, I have only had to follow, with slight modifications, the admirable arrangement 
proposed by Brown and further developed by Endlicher and Meissner ; but in the great 
subdivision into Nucamentacese and Folliculares, these terms must not be taken strictly in their 
literal sense, for indehiscent drupes occur in both divisions. Taking, however, the fruit 
generally, in conjunction with the arrangement of the ovules and the inflorescence, neither of 
them again strictly constant, we have very fairly definite characters for two large groups which 
are both natural and to a certain degree geographical. For although both are abundant in 
Australia, the Nucamentaeese alone are in Africa, and the Folliculares alone in Asia and 
America. — Benth. 
Series 1. Nucamentaces , — Fruit an indehiscent nut or drupe. I lowers usually 
- solitary within each bract. 
Tribe I. Proteeae. — Anthers all perfect or very rarely the upper one abortive, with 2 
parallel cells adnate to the connectivum, inserted at the base of the short spreading larnime of the 
perianth. Ovule 1 or rarely 2. Stigma terminal. Fruit a dry nut. 
Flowers in dense cone-like spikes or heads with imbricate scale-like bracts, 
with few or many outer empty bracts forming an involucre. Anthers 
free. 
Cone-scales firmly adhering to the rhachis and opening for the emission 
of the more or less flattened nuts 1 . Petrophila. 
Cone-scales either very deciduous or remaining closely imbricate after 
flowering till they fall off with the nuts which are not flattened ... 2. Isopogon. 
