104 
TUENERACEJ5. 
Order XXXIX. TURNERACEAS. 
Flowers regular, hermaphrodite. Calyx-tube campanulate ; teeth 5, 
imbricated. Petals 5, membranous, obovate-unguiculate. Stamens 5, 
inserted low down in the calyx-tube ; filaments rather flattened ; anthers 
oblong, splitting down the sides. Ovary free, 1-celled; placentas 3, 
parietal ; ovules many, horizontal ; styles 3, subulate, free from the 
base; stigmas terminal. Fruit a loculicidal capsule ; seeds numerous, 
minute, albuminous. — Herbs or shrubs, with alternate petioled exstipu- 
late simple leaves, with flowers usually solitary in their axils. Distrib. 
Mainly tropical American. Species 70-80. 
Herbaceous ; seeds not crested with a tuft of hairs. ... * Turnera. 
Tree ; seeds crested with a tuft of hairs 1. Mathurina. 
* Turnera ulmifolia , Linn. ; DC. Prod. iii. 246, (T. angustifolia, Bot. 
Mag. t. 281), a native of Tropical America, is a frequent weed in 
Mauritius and the Seychelles. It is an erect biennial, with large alter- 
nate petioled simple lanceolate acute deeply toothed slightly hairy 
leaves, flowers solitary from the upper axils on peduncles connate with 
the petioles, calyx an inch long with 5 lanceolate teeth and a funnel- 
shaped tube, 5 obovate bright yellow large fugacious petals, 5 stamens 
inserted with the petals in the calyx-tube, a 1-celled ovary with 3 
parietal placentas, 3 filiform styles and a loculicidal many-seeded 
capsule. 
1. MATHURINA, Balf. fil. 
Sepals 5, lanceolate-cuspidate, with a tubercle on the face at the base, 
imbricated in aestivation. Petals 5, obovate, membranous, fugacious, 
about as long as the sepals. Stamens 5, exserted, inserted at the base 
of the sepals ; filaments long, slightly flattened ; anthers oblong. Ovary 
oblong, sessile, 1-celled ; placentas 3, parietal ; styles subulate ; stigmas 
capitate. Fruit a triquetrous 3-valved capsule. Seeds minute, bottle- 
shaped, crested with a tuft of hairs. — The only known species. Closely 
allied to the monotypic Central American genus Erllichia , Seem., of 
which the fruit is unknown. 
1. M. penduliflora, Balf. fil. in Journ. Linn. Soc. xv. 160. A small 
tree, glabrous in all its parts, with stout terete branch lets marked in the 
lower part with the scars of the fallen leaves. Leaves crowded, shortly 
petioled, oblanceolate, acute, 3-4 in. long, an inch broad, deeply crenate, 
cuneate and entire at the base, varying in young plants to ligulate, 
£ in. broad, subcoriaceous, the fine distinct veinlets connected by intra- 
marginal arches. Flowers pendulous, solitary in the axils of the leaves, 
on peduncles 1-2 in. long, with a pair of linear bracts at the middle. 
Sepals and petals an inch long. Stamens and styles nearly twice as 
long. Capsules oblong-triquetrous, an inch long, the valves nearly flat 
on the back. 
Rodriguez, frequent in the higher parts of the interior of the island, Balfour l 
Endemic. Bois Gandine. 
