CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOTANY. 
351 
twelve sepals in four series, gradually decreasing outwards in 
size ; these are very concave, suborbicular, somewhat pointed at 
the apex, the three inner ones are 2 lines long, with thick val- 
vate margins ; the six petals are oblong, ^ line long, fixed ex- 
ternally opposite the six stamens, all seated on the apex of a 
very short column together with a tuft of stiff hairs, as long as 
the stamens, concealing the rudiments of six sterile ovaries ; the 
filaments are much thickened above. Innately incurved, termi- 
nating in a long, conical, excurrent connective pointing towards 
the axis; the anther-cells are separated and laterally semi- 
immersed in the fleshy filament. The $ panicle, or rather clus- 
tered head of flowers, is seated on a very short peduncle ; the 
sepals are similar in size to those of the ^ flower, a little more 
pointed and oblong ; the sterile stamens are fixed in the centre 
round the much larger, gibbously oblong, pilose ovaries, which 
gradually terminate in as many terete styles diagonally con- 
verging towards the axis ; the drupes, seated upon a rounded 
fleshy hairy receptacle, are 3t lines long, 3 lines broad, fixed by 
a small hilum on the lower ventral angle, the upper angle being 
marked by the vestige of the style; the putamen is dorsally 
3-ribbed, with a small excavation in the middle of the ventral 
face ; the structure of the seed has been already fully described. 
50. Pycnarkhena. 
This genus was established by me in 1851 upon an Indian 
plant in the Wallichian Collection. It is easily recognized by 
its oblong, acuminated, simply penninerved leaves, upon short 
and remarkably tumid petioles : this manner of nervation, 
though less frequent, is not rare among the MerdspermacecE ; 
for it occurs also in Hyperbcena, Antitaxis, Penianthus, Clambus, 
Elissarrhena, Spirospermum, and Rhaptonema. It is also remarka- 
ble for having nine stamens almost without filaments, or, rather, 
as many 2-celled anthers, crowded in three series so as to form a 
sessile central head, after the manner oiAnamirta; the anthers are 
transversely oval, 2-valved, gaping by a common horizontal suture. 
The drupe is oval, with the vestige of the style placed a little 
above the middle on the ventral face; the putamen is reniformly 
oval, somewhat compressed, thin and testaceous, the seed being 
appended to the slight intrusion of an almost obsolete con- 
dyle on the ventral side ; the embryo is exalbuminous ; the co- 
tyledons, occupying almost the whole space of the cell, are very 
fleshy, accumbent. Innately incurved at the apex towards the 
ventral face, where the minute radicle points to the persistent 
style. The genus comes near to Antitaxis, 
