76 
WRIGHT : THE GENUS DIOSPYROS 
Sex. 
According to Hiern the genus Diospyros is characterized 
by dioecious flowers, and only rarely is a polygamous or 
monoecious state to be observed. It is further stated that 
when such departures from the dioecious condition do occur 
they do so only casually, and one .is left to infer that the 
variation is one to be explained on individual grounds and is 
not of specific importance. 
Including species imperfectly known, Hiern describes 
170, and of these only 7 per cent, are recorded by himself 
or others as showing a departure from the dioecious con¬ 
dition. 
Accordingly, Hiern formed a classification for the whole 
of the Ebenaceæ, showing the genus Royena, L., with 
hermaphrodite or rarely subdiœcious flowers and the remain¬ 
ing genera, viz., Euclea, Linn ., Maba, Forst ., Diospyros, L., 
and Tetraclis, gen. nov ., with dioecious or rarely polygamous 
flowers. 
Confining ourselves to the Ceylon representatives of 
Diospyros, we find that Thwaites and Trimen believed the 
genus to be characterized by dioecious flowers, and that the 
flowers were only very rarely monoecious. Thwaites noted 
the departure from the dioecious condition in two of our 
species, and stated that in D. acuta the flowers were sometimes 
monoecious, and that in D. hirsuta the female flowers are 
sometimes intermixed with the male. 
The main source of error has probably been in that the 
material at hand has not been very abundant, or the exami¬ 
nation has been made upon herbarium specimens or material 
which had been collected some time previously. In the so- 
called “ male ” flowers of D. Gardneri there is very little 
external character indicative of a fertile pistil in the fresh 
material, and it is only by continued observation that ripe 
fruits may be seen. 
Herbarium specimens of known hermaphrodite and poly¬ 
gamous flowers of D. affinis, D. hirsuta, and others do not 
show any prominent external differences from known male 
