No. 227. 
Bracky chitoft acenfolius F.V.M. 
The Flame-Tree. 
r * 
(Family STERCULIACE^E ) 
Botanical description. Genus, Brachychiton Schott and Endlicher Melet. lot. 34 
(1832). See also R. Brown by J. J. Bennett in Horsefield's Plant Javanicce 
Rariores, p. 234. 
Following is a translation of the original : 
Calyx 5-fid. Anthers congested. Styles cohering. Stigmas distinct or joined together as a 
peltate one. Follicles coriaceous, woody, polyspermous. Seeds albuminous, covered with stellate hairs, 
cohering to one another and to the bottom of the follicle. The radicle of the embryo next to the hilum. 
Trees (of New Holland) with lobed or undivided leaves. 
Botanical description. Species, B. acerifolius F.v.M. Fragment i, 1 (1858). 
A large timber tree, quite glabrous. 
Leaves on long petioles, deeply 5- or 7-lobed; lobes oblong-lanceolate or almost rhomboid, 
occasionally deeply sinuate, the whole leaf often 8 or 10 inches diameter, thin but shining, 
and glabrous on both sides. 
Flotoen of a rich red (scatlet), in loose axillary racemes or small panicles of 2 to 3 inches. 
Calyx broadly campanulate, f inch long, quite glabrous, with short broad lobes, valvate in the 
bud. 
Ovary raised on a short column, quite glabrous, the carpels quite distinct, and the styles scarcely 
cohering at the broad radiating stigmas. 
Follicles large, on long stalks, quite glabrous. (B. II. i, 229, as Sterculia.) 
Botanical Name. Brachychiton, from the Greek, Brachus short, chiton of 
mail, in allusion to the short bristles, and was given to denote the genus, chiefly 
distinguished by the seeds having a loose outer coating covered with hairs, which, in 
some species, are so adhesive that the seeds fall out in their inner coat only, leaving 
the outer coat adhering to the equally hairy endocarp, with the appearance of the cells 
of a bee-hive. The appearance of " mail " is more far-fetched. Acerifolia, from the 
Latin Acer, a Maple-tree, refers to the shape of the leaves, and in some old books, in 
which an attempt is made to invent vernaculars, we find the Flame-tree referred to as 
" The Maple-leaved Sterculia." 
