294 
LAURACEJB. 
[. Hernmdia . 
aceous, green on both surfaces, with the petiole attached J-l in. above 
the base, with 7 veins radiating from the point of its insertion. Peduncles 
as long or longer than the petioles. Inflorescence and flowers just like 
those of H. ovigera. Seem. FI. Vit. tab. 52. H. Sonora, Linn, in 
part. H. ovigera, Bojer , in part. 
Seychelles, common on the shores of Mahe and Praslin, Horne , 331 ! Polynesia 
to Madagascar and the Comoro islands. What we have received from Mauritius as 
Sassafras mauritiana , Bojer, Hort. Maur. p. 273, is just like this in general habit, 
but with some of the leaves deeply three-lobed from the top, and is without 
flowers. Bois Blanc. 
Order LXXXVI.* CASUARINE.E. 
* Casuarina equisetifolia, Forst. ; Miquel in DC. Prod. xvi. 2, 338 ; 
(C. muricata, Roxb. ; C. lateriflora, Lam.), a native of the Malay Archi- 
pelago, now widely spread through the tropics of the Old World, is one of 
the commonest trees both in Mauritius and the Seychelles. It is 30-50 
feet high, with a straight trunk, crowded slender terete branchlets with- 
out leaves, but with 7 ribs aud 7 little teeth like those of au Equisetum 
at each distinctly-jointed node, achlamydeous flowers, the males of a 
single stamen each crowded in cylindrical catkins at the end of the 
branchlets, the females in globose heads from the same branches on 
short lateral peduncles, with two long red filiform styles and two hard 
ovate capsule-valves enclosing a single winged seed. Filao. 
Order LXXXYTL PIPERACE.®. 
Flowers in hermaphrodite or dioicous spikes, without any perianth, 
but subtended by a peltate stalked or sessile bract ; rachis often 
fleshy and usually pitted. Stameus 2-3, sometimes more numerous ; 
anthers 2-4-valved, usually sessile, dehiscing longitudinally. Ovary 
1 -celled, usually sessile ; ovule solitary, sessile, basilar, orthotropous ; 
stigma usually sessile, simple or many-lobed. Fruit fleshy or dry ; 
embryo placed outside a large mass of albumen and included in the 
persistent embryo-sac. — Herbs or shrubs with simple exstipulate 
petioled more or less succulent leaves variously arranged, and minute 
flowers packed tightly in the spikes. Fibro-vascular bundles scattered. 
Distrib. Round the world in the tropics in shady woods. Species 
1000 . 
Shrubs, with 4-valved anthers 1 . Piper. 
Herbs, with 2-valved anthers 2. Peperomia. 
1. PIPER, Linn. 
Flowers hermaphrodite or unisexual. Bract sessile or stalked. 
Stamens in our species 2 or 3, the latter posticous ; mature anther 
