190 
CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOTANY. 
upon slender, drooping, solitary peduncles, which are few, and 
fasciculated at the ends of the terminal branchlets, appearing in 
the axils of the fallen leaves of the previous year’s growth, before 
the new leaves sprout, so that the branchlets then bear the sem- 
blance of racemes ; but before the fall of the corolla, other young 
branchlets grow out of the axils with great rapidity, to a con- 
siderable length, producing fresh leaves in abundance, which 
completely destroy the racemose appearance of the branchlets. 
The peduncles are longer than the flowers, which resemble those 
of Styrax officinalis. In their structure the anthers quite con- 
form to those of Styrax and Strigilia, the two parallel linear 
lobes being separated by a considerable interval, quite adnate 
for their entire length upon a more or less broad ligular fila- 
ment, very thin and membranous in texture, and bursting in- 
wardly by a longitudinal fissure : the filaments continue broad 
and compressed to their base, where they are laxly connate for 
a short distance, and at the same time they slightly agglutinate 
together the bottom of the claws of the petals — all being easily 
separated without any laceration of the parts ; indeed before the 
flower fades they become detached from one another of their 
own accord ; it is therefore incorrect to describe the corolla as 
monopetalous, and the stamens as monadelphous. I have ob- 
served that in H. tetraptera the style is simple throughout its 
entire length; but in H. diptera it most frequently (but not 
always) divides into three distinct thread-like portions for a 
considerable distance from the summit. There is generally 
much symmetry in the number of its parts : in H. tetraptera the 
caljTc is 4-toothed, the petals four in number, and the stamens 
eight or twelve; in H. diptera the same numbers prevail, the 
stamens not exceeding eight ; but in the latter species there are 
sometimes five teeth in the calyx, and in such case there are 
five, rarely six petals, and the number of stamens is diminished 
to seven or six ; but these are probably only exceptional occur- 
rences. The style is conical and hollow at its base for about a 
quarter of its length upwards, the three or four parietal nervures 
continued from the inner surface of the ovary extending along 
the sides of this hollow cavity. The structure of the ovary, and 
the singular mode of its development and growth, have been 
minutely described in a preceding page (167). From these 
observations, which are in great part novel, I have drawn up the 
following character of the genus. 
Halesia, Ellis. — Flores hermaphroditi. Calyx parvus, turbi- 
natus, ovario adnatus, margine libero hinc breviter 4-5-denti- 
culatus, dentibus acutis, erectis, nervis medianis cum carinis 
totidem decurrentibus continuis. Petala 4-5, dentibus caly- 
