196 
WRIGHT : THE GENUS DIOSPYROS 
Fruit green or yellow when ripe, globose, slightly apicu- 
late, becomes glabrous, 30 mm. diameter, 25 mm. long ; 
fruiting calyx enlarged, 30 mm. diameter, rather flattened 
with segments glabrous, black, apices in contact with carpel- 
lary wall, margins retiexed, intersegmental pouch large. 
Seeds usually 4, ovate, wedge shaped, 18 mm. long, 11 mm. 
wide, 7 mm. thick ; testa deep brown ; endosperm copious 
and ruminate. 
Seedlings epigeal, cotyledons detached early, epicotyledon- 
ary system well developed before detachment of cotyledons 
occurs ; cotyledons white, 11 mm. long, ovate, apex obtuse ; 
hypocotyl white, 7 cm. long ; epicotyledonary stem reddish, 
pubescent, 4 mm. long ; epicotyledonary leaves form an 
opposite pair, ovate, tapering towards base, apex tapering, 
obtuse ; venation reticulate ; 35 mm. long, 20 mm. wide ; 
traces 3 per cotyledon, fairly equal in strength, xylem of 
lateral strands split to varying degrees ; one epicotyledonary 
trace per leaf, continued into hypocotyl and root. 
Timber .—The coloured heartwood is usually small but 
occasionally very good ; one tree measuring 24*4 metres high 
(80 feet) and nearly 2 metres . circumference, (6| feet) 
possessed a small black heartwood only 100 mm. (4 inches) 
diameter ; in some specimens much smaller than the fore¬ 
going the heartwood was large, streaked brown, and probably 
sold as “ bastard ” ebony ; such samples are often equal to 
our best woods from an ornamental point of view (<cf . D. 
oocarpa). (See pi. I., fig. 4). 
The colouring matter is very abundant even in the sap- 
wood ; the fibres are very high in percentage number, and 
possess narrow lumina. 
Rings of growth are inconspicuous. 
Distribution .—dry and intermediate zones, rather rare ; 
between Uma-oya and Bilihul-oya on the lower Badulla 
road from Kandy ; Viriniya, near Bibile ; Bintenna, Kanta- 
lai, Kalugalla, Yavuniya. 
Also in Tinnevelly, S. India. 
