. The natural history of plants. Botany. 24 NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. Oxalis violacect. In the inner angle of each cell is a placenta supporting one, two, or an indefinite number of descendent, anatropous ovules with exterior and superior micropyle, disposed at first in two vertical series'. The fruit, generally accompanied by the persistent calyx, is a loculicidal capsule, the pericarp remaining after dehiscence adhering to the axis of the fruit,^ By the clefts of dehiscence escape a very variable number of seeds con- taining, under their triple coat,^ a fleshy albumen, the axis being occu-
. The natural history of plants. Botany. 24 NATURAL HISTORY OF PLANTS. Oxalis violacect. In the inner angle of each cell is a placenta supporting one, two, or an indefinite number of descendent, anatropous ovules with exterior and superior micropyle, disposed at first in two vertical series'. The fruit, generally accompanied by the persistent calyx, is a loculicidal capsule, the pericarp remaining after dehiscence adhering to the axis of the fruit,^ By the clefts of dehiscence escape a very variable number of seeds con- taining, under their triple coat,^ a fleshy albumen, the axis being occu- pied by a straight embryo. The outer coat, thick and fleshy,* opens at maturity (fig. 61) and separates from the ianei* parts of the seed elastically throwing them to a distance. This genus contains at least two hundred species,^ natives especially of South Africa and the tropical and temperate regions of South America. There are some half dozen species widely dispersed, some in the tropical, others in. temperate regions of the whole world. They are herbs, undershrubs or shrubs of small size. The leaves are alternate, petiolate, compound-pin- nate or digitate, trifoliate or formed of a large number of articulate folioles," entire or bilobate, more rarely reduced to a single Fig. 64. Habit. 1 They have two coats. The exostome is often prolonged into a more or less thick tube some- times capped hy an ohturator. 2 In Biophytiim (fig. 67) the valves of the fruit always expand into the form of a star. * The deep layer is membraneous and whitish. The middle layer is thick, crustaceous, of dusky colour. * Formed of whitish cellules or rarely of tracheal bundles. sjAca. Oxalid. Man. Vindob. (1794), in-4. —Eeiohb. Ic. Fl. Germ. v. t. 199.—Zucc. in Denks. Ah. Miinoh. ix. (1825), t. 1-6 ; in Abh. Milnch. i. (1831), —H. B. K. Nov. Oen. et Spec. V. t. 466-471.—A. S. H. PL Us. Bras. i. 104, t. 43-45 ; Fl. Bras. Mer. i. 104, t. 21-25.— C. Gat, Fl. CMl. i. 122.
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, booksubjectbotany, bookyear1871
