102 
CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOTANY 
albuminous seeds ; these two genera are therefore clearly refer- 
able to the Apetala of Endlicher, which are nearly equivalent 
to the Monochlamydeee of DeCandolle. If Sarcostigma then be 
related to the Phytocrenece, — an affinity which, if we accept, we 
must admit has not yet been demonstrated, — it is clear that it 
cannot bear any relation to the two genera before mentioned, 
which appear to have .been associated with that group upon very 
insufficient grounds ; and if, as above indicated, the Phytoa-enece 
be allowed to rank among the Diahjpetalm, it appears to me their 
position would not be far from the Tiliacea or Dipterocarpea, to 
which families they offer many analogous characters : from 
Prof. Blume’s analysis, they would much resemble the latter in 
the structm’e of the seed ; under Prof. Lindley’s view, they would 
more nearly approach the former. 
The observations that now follow were written several months 
ago, and as they are confined wholly to the description of facts, 
there is no occasion to retract anything there advanced in con- 
sequence of what is said above. 
The genus Sarcostigma, to which I have alluded {huj. op. 
p. 53) as belonging to the Sarcostigmece, one of the ti’ibes of the 
Icacinacees, was founded in 1832 by Drs. Wight and Arnott, on 
an Indian plant collected by Dr. Klein, and described by them in 
the 14th volume of the 'Edinburgh New Phil. Journal.’ Like 
Desmostachys, it is somewhat scandent in its habits, but it has 
large oblong leaves upon very short petioles, and, as in that ge- 
nus, it has an extremely long and slender spicated inflorescence, 
studded at close intervals with fascicles of small flowers, which 
in drying retain their bright yellow colour, and are vei’y deci- 
duous, being articulated upon very short and almost obsolete 
pedicels. The flowers, in the only case I have seen, are all 
female, and their stamens, which are sterile, are alternate with 
the petals; the internal structure of the ovarium corresponds 
with the usual character of the order : in the form of its epigy- 
nous stigmatoid summit it resembles Stemonurus, and what I 
have stated concerning the nature of this part in that genus ap- 
pears confirmed by the circumstances that occur here : in some 
cases this appears like a flat, glabrous, fleshy disk, with a depres- 
sion in the centre, as in the following genus Discophora, but it 
seems afterwards to attain the form of a somewhat conical um- 
braculiform process, overhanging the ovax’ium, with a crenated 
margin, and hollow in the centre. This process therefore, as in 
Stemonurus, would seem to be a growth subsequent to the 
period of impregnation : it will be remembered that a somewhat 
analogous succeeding development on the summit of the ovarium 
has been described in the case of Apodytes. In the rugous sur- 
face of its putamen, as recorded in the manuscript of Dr. Klein, it 
