14 
World ; most abundant in the East Indies. They were formeidy common in 
Egypt, but are now extinct in that country, according to Delile. 
Properties. Chiefly remarkable for the beauty of the flowers. The 
fruit of Nelumbium speciosum is believed to have been the Egyptian bean of 
Pythagoras. The nuts of all the species are eatable and wholesome. The 
root, or, more properly, the creeping stem, is used as food in China. 
GENUS. 
Nelumbium, Juss. 
Nelumbo, Gaertn. 
Cyamus, Salisb. 
Order V. CEPHALOTACE^. 
Cephalote^, R. Brown, Phil. Mag. (1832); Martins Conspectus, No 178. (1835). — 
Cephalotace^, Lindl. Key, No. 5. (1835). 
Essential Character. — Calyx coloured, six parted, with a valvate aestivation. 
Corolla 0. Stamens 12, those opposite the sepals shortest, inserted into the edge of a 
deep glandular perigynous disk ; anthers with a thick granular connective. Carpels 6, dis- 
tinct, one seeded; ovule erect. Akenia membranous, opening by the ventral suture, sur- 
rounded by the persistent calyx and stamens. Seed solitary (very seldom two) erect. 
Embryo minute, in the base of the axis of a fleshy friable somewhat oily albumen. — A stem- 
less herb with exstipulate leaves, among which are mingled operculate pitchers. Scape sim- 
ple, bearing a compound terminal spike. Flowers small. 
Affinities. Allied according to LabiUardiere to Rosaceae, and according 
to Jussieu, to Crassulaceae ; according to Brown the order should be placed 
between Crassulaceae and Francoaceae. Its very copious albumen and apocar- 
pous fruit seem however to flx it far from the former of those orders, in the 
Ranal alliance, from which it forms a natural transition to Francoaceae in the 
Pittosporal alliance, and through those plants to Sarraceniaceae, in which the 
leaves are in like manner transformed into pitchers. The paradoxical genus, 
Dionaea, where in like manner a strong tendency exists to the foraiation of 
pitcher, does really seem to be the type of an order difiering in little from 
Cephalotaceae except in the presence of petals, and in the syncarpous fruit with 
the seeds collected upon a flat central placenta. 
Geography. Marsh plants, found in New Holland, (and the southern 
states of North America ?) 
Properties. Unknown. 
GENERA. 
§ ? DlONiEACEiE. 
Cephalotus, R. Br. Dionaea, L. 
Alliance IL ANONALES. 
Essential Character. — W oody plants in all cases, often trees, with the fruit com- 
posed of distinct carpels, which occasionally grow together into a solid mass. The valves of 
the anthers separating by a perpendicular line. 
This alhance is hardly to be separated from Ranales by any better general 
character than its constantly woody and often arborescent stems ; to which may 
be added a great tendency to be aromatic. It is known from Berberales by 
the dehiscence of its anthers, from Pittosporales by its apocarpous fruit, and 
from the Umbellal and Grossal alliances by its stamens being hypogynous. 
