198 
ON ERYTHROPHLEUM JUDICIALE. 
terminal buds, often thirty or forty, develope as flower buds, each 
producing a raceme, so as to form large panicles. The spikes or 
racemes which are articulated with the branched flower-stems, vary 
in length from three to six inches, and when the flowers are fully 
expanded, are from six to eight lines in diameter. The peduncles 
are cylindrical and fluted, and the flowers are arranged around 
them on short pedicels, about half a line to a line in length, vary- 
ing from one hundred to four hundred in number. Their close ar- 
rangement, short pedicels and exsert stamens, give them somewhat 
the aspect of the catkins of some amentaceae. The florets expand 
nearly equally, which gives to the inflorescence of the sassy, a 
graceful and plume-like aspect. Flowers. — Calyx regular, cup- 
shaped, five-cleft, tomentose externally. (See Fig. l ab.) Corolla, 
valvate in expanding, petals five, oblong obovate, very tomentose 
exteriorly, alternate with the limbs of the calyx, (a c.) Stame?is 
ten, perigynous, exsert, inserted on either side of the petals, (c) 
filaments cylindrical, smooth, twice the length of the petals, anthers 
ovoid, two-lobed, yellow, and dehisce longitudinally. At the base 
of the petals and surrounding the pistil are five glands (6) aboutthe 
size of the anthers. Pistil. — The pistil projects beyond the corol 
la, (ab) is as long as the stamens, and consists of an elongated very 
tomentose ovary, the woolly covering of which increases its diame- 
ter one half; and a stigma sessile, conical, smooth, about one sixth 
as long as the ovary, and furnished at top with a round foramen. 
When sliced longitudinally the ovules are visible, (d) Legumes, 
from two to four inches long, and from one to two wide, violin 
shaped, chestnut colored, coriaceous, compressed, obtuse at both 
ends when fully developed, bivalved, two to five-seeded, and dehisce 
by the dorsal suture. Seeds have an oblong oval flattened shape, 
are black, and covered with a very gummy transparent substance, 
analogous to cerasin. The episperm is hard and horny, enclosing 
a tough hard light grey albumen, nearly surrounding the cotyledons, 
which are compressed, indurated and of a yellowish green color. 
One of the features of this species Erythrophleum, is the 
sparsity of fruit compared with the abundance of inflorescence, 
as may be observed by comparing figures 1 and 2. The 
former represents but one branch of a terminal panicle of 
flowers; the latter, all the fruit of the whole panicle that 
reached maturity. This habit is quite common, however, as noticed 
