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CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOTANY. 
degree of affinity with the Magnoliacece, they are distinguished 
from them by several peculiar features : the latter are invariably 
signalized by very conspicuous and large vaginiform stipules, 
which fall off and leave a prominent annular cicatrice, like an 
articulation, round each node. In the Winteracea these stipules 
are entirely wanting. The wood, in the latter family, as well as 
in the Canellacea, and sometimes in the Schizandracecs, contains 
vessels marked, like those of the Coniferce, with very distinct 
dots, which are not visible in the Magnoliacece. The bark, as 
also the foliage of the Winteracece and Canellaceai, abounds in 
an aromatic principle, and the younger leaves exhibit many pel- 
lucid dots, which are less visible in an older state, on account of 
the greater thickness and opacity of the parenchyma : this cha- 
racter is wanting in the Magnoliacece ; or, if sometimes present, 
these dots are exceedingly minute and faint. In the latter family 
the several parts of the flower spring from a broad and highly 
conical torus, whereas this is extremely small in the Winteracece. 
In the latter group the ovaries are generally few, and always in 
a single whorl, sometimes reduced to two in number, or even 
solitary ; in Magnoliacece, on the contrary, they are constantly 
very numerous, being arranged imbricately in many series upon 
a conical or almost cylindrical torus. The structure of the fruit 
in this last-mentioned family affords a very characteristic fea- 
ture, generally consisting of a large cone or ball of many-seried 
aggregated capsules, more or less free, but sometimes forming a 
solid syncarpium ; these capsules generally open by two valves, 
each exhibiting one or two tolerably large seeds (covered by a 
brilliant scarlet fleshy tunic), which fall out and remain sus- 
pended each by a long elastic thread : in the Winteracece the 
fruit is small, consisting of a few radiating carpels generally 
distinct; in Illicium, somewhat two-valvular; but in Drimys 
and Tasmannia, baccate, enclosing a few small, shining, black, 
cochleate seeds, of a structure different from those of Magno- 
liacece, and remarkably similar to those of the Canellacece : the 
hard crustaceous tunic, hitherto mistaken for the testa, so con- 
spicuous in the latter family and the Winteracece, presents a 
striking contrast to the scarlet soft tunic, suspended by a long 
thread, in the Magnoliacece : in the latter order the raphe is found 
in this external fleshy coating, while the tunic beneath it is thick, 
hard, and bony ; but in the Winteracece and Canellacece the outer 
coating is hard, brittle, and void of vessels of any kind ; the 
raphe is seen in the second tunic, which is thick, soft and 
spongy (analogous to the outer tunic of Magnolia), while the 
coating next beneath it is thin and membranaceous. The em- 
bryo, in the former order, is situated in the axis of the albumen, 
at the extremity farthest removed from the hilum, and beneath 
