Page:Transactions of the Linnean Society of London, Volume 12.djvu/175

Rh This second instance occurs in Peliosanthes Teta of Andrews's Repository and the Botanical Magazine.

In this monocotyledonous plant, which in 1812 nearly ripened seed in Mr. Lambert's collection at Boyton, the ovarium coheres with the tube of the perianthium or corolla, and has originally three cells, each containing two ovula. Soon after impregnation has taken place, from one to three of these ovula rapidly increase in size, by their pressure prevent the development of the others, and rupture the ovarium, which remains, but little enlarged at the base of the fruit, consisting of from one to three naked berry-like seeds.

In the Botanical Magazine Mr. Ker, in describing a second species of Peliosanthes, takes the opportunity of altering in some respects the character of the genus he had previously given, and of adding a description of its supposed pericarpium, from an inspection, as it seems, of the unripe fruit of Peliosanthes Teta. It is evident, however, that he is not aware of its real structure; and consequently does not succeed in reconciling its appearance with the unquestionable fact of its having "germen inferum."

There are some cases in which this early opening of the ovarium, instead of being, as in the preceding instances, an irregular bursting, apparently caused by the pressure of the enlarged ovula, is a regular dehiscence in the direction of the suture. Of this Sterculia platanifolia and S.colorata are remarkable examples; their folliculi after opening, which takes place long before the maturity of the seeds, acquiring the form and texture of leaves, to whose thickened margins the ovula continue firmly attached until they ripen. Another example of this early and regular dehiscence occurs in an undescribed genus of the same family, which differs from Sterculia platanifolia in its pericarpium having a terminal wing and a single seed.

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