Page:Manual of the New Zealand Flora.djvu/117

Plagianthus.] than the leaves. Calyx hemispherical, 5-toothed. Petals small, oblong-obovate, veined. Staminal tube with 8–12 large sessile anthers. Ovary 1-celled, rarely 2-celled; ovules 1 in each cell; styles the same number as the cells, clavate or flattened. Fruiting carpel about the size of a peppercorn, globose or rarely didymous, downy, bursting irregularly. Seeds solitary, or very rarely 2.—''A. Rich. Fl. Nouv. Zel. 299; A. Cunn. Precur. n. 604; Raoul, Choix de Plantes, 48; Hook. Bot. Mag. t. 3271; Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 29; Handb. N.Z. Fl. 30; Buch. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xvi. t. 34, f. 2; Kirk, Students' Fl.'' 70.

2. P. cymosus, T. Kirk, Students' Fl. 70.—A small closely branched tree about 20 ft. in height, glabrous except a few scattered stellate hairs on the young shoots and branches of the inflorescence. Leaves alternate or in alternate fascicles, ½–1¼ in. long, linear or linear-oblong or linear-obovate, obtuse or subacute, with a few deep serratures towards the tip; petioles slender, ¼–½ in. long. Flowers small, unisexual, in small axillary 5–15-flowered cymes, 1–1½ in. long, or in fascicles of 3–5, rarely solitary. Calyx campanulate, 5-toothed, narrower in the female flowers. Petals 5, ovate-spathulate or oblong-spathulate, much reduced in size in the females. Staminal column long and slender, with numerous anthers at the top. Ovary 1–2-celled; styles 1–2, clavate or broad and flattened. Fruiting carpels about $1⁄5$ in. diam., didymous or globose, downy, seated in the persistent calyx.

3. P. betulinus, A. Cunn. Precur. n. 605.—A handsome leafy tree 30–60 ft. high, with a trunk sometimes 3 ft. in diam.; when young forming a straggling bush with interlaced tortuous branches. Bark exceedingly tough; branchlets, young leaves, petioles, and inflorescence more or less hoary with stellate hairs. Leaves of young plants small, ⅓–¾ in. long, broadly ovate or rounded to ovate-lanceolate, deeply and irregularly lobed or crenate-serrate. Leaves of mature plants 1–3 in. long, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, acuminate, coarsely crenate-serrate or doubly serrate, rounded or cuneate at