XXXVII. SAPINDACEÆ.
Trees or shrubs, with alternate pinnate petiolate persistent or deciduous leaves, without stipules. Flowers regular or irregular, polygamo-diœcious, polygamo-monœcious or polygamous; calyx of 4 or 5 sepals or lobes imbricated in the bud; petals 4 or 5 imbricated in the bud; disk annular, fleshy, 5-lobed, or unilateral and oblique; stamens usually 7—10, inserted on the disk; filaments free; anthers introrse, 2-celled, the cells opening longitudinally; ovary 2—4 or 3-celled; styles terminal; stigmas capitate or lobed; ovule solitary or 2 in each cell, anatropous or amphitropous. Fruit a drupe or capsule. Seed usually solitary, without albumen; seed-coat bony, coriaceous or crustaceous.
Of the one hundred and twenty-six genera of this family, which is chiefly confined to the tropics and is more abundant in the Old than in the New World, four have arborescent representatives in the United States.
CONSPECTUS OF THE ARBORESCENT GENERA OF THE UNITED STATES.
Fruit baccate. Fruit dark orange-color or yellow, with thin semitranslucent coriaceous flesh; ovules 1 in each cell of the ovary; leaflets subcoriaceous to coriaceous.1. [Sapindus.] Fruit purple, with thick juicy flesh; ovules 2 in each cell of the ovary; leaflets thin, persistent.2. [Exothea.] Fruit a drupe; leaves 3-foliolate, persistent.3. [Hypelate.] Fruit a 3-valved capsule; leaves 4 or 5, rarely 3-foliolate, deciduous.4. [Ungnadia.]