Shrubs or trees. Leaves simple. Flowers regular. Calyx 5-partite, imbricate in bud. Petals 5, free, inserted below the disc. Stamens 3-5, inserted upon or within the disc. Filaments free, strap-shaped. Ovary 3-celled, with 2-10 inverted ovules in each cell. Style 1 or 0. Fruit drupaceous or capsular or separating into several mericarps. Seeds exalbuminous.—Genera 3, species 110. Tropical and South Africa. (Under CELASTRINEAE.) (Plate 83.)
1. Stamens 5. Anthers opening inwards by a transverse slit. Disc indistinct.
Ovules 6-8 to each ovary-cell. Leaves opposite, serrate.—Species
4. West Africa. Campylostemon Welw.
Stamens 3. Anthers opening outwards. Disc distinct. 2
2. Fruit drupaceous. Petals imbricate in bud. Flowers usually in fascicles or in fascicled cymes.—Species 60. Tropical and South Africa.
Several species yield rubber or edible fruits. (Plate 83.) Salacia L.
Fruit capsular or separating into several mericarps. Anthers roundish.
Leaves opposite. Flowers usually in simple cymes.—Species 50.
Tropics to Delagoa Bay. Some are used medicinally. (Including
Helictonema Pierre). Hippocratea L.
[FAMILY 131.] SALVADORACEAE.
Shrubs or trees. Leaves opposite, simple, entire, with minute stipules. Flowers solitary or in spikes, racemes or panicles, regular. Calyx 2-4-cleft. Petals 4, very rarely 5, free or united at the base, with imbricate or contorted aestivation. Stamens as many as and alternate with the petals; sometimes 4-5 staminodes also present. Ovary superior, 1-2-celled. Ovules 1-2 in each cell, erect, inverted. Style simple, short. Fruit a berry or a drupe. Seeds exalbuminous; embryo with the radicle turned downwards.—Genera 3, species 6.
1. Flowers dioecious. Petals 4, free, narrow. Filaments free from one another and from the corolla. Glands between the stamens absent.
Ovary 2-celled. Shrubs with 2-6 spines in the axils of the leaves.—Species
2. Tropical and South Africa. Used medicinally. (Monetia
L’Hér.) Azima Lam.
Flowers hermaphrodite or polygamous. Filaments united together or to the corolla. Glands between the stamens nearly always present.
Ovary 1-celled. Unarmed shrubs or trees. 2
2. Petals free, narrow. Filaments united at the base. Anthers oblong.—Species
3. East Africa. Yielding timber. (Including Platymitium
Warb.) Dobera Juss.
Petals united at the base, broad, 4. Filaments free. Anthers ovoid or globose.—Species 1 (S. persica Garcin). North-east and Central
Africa to Delagoa Bay. Yields edible fruits and medicaments; the twigs are used as tooth-brushes. Salvadora Garcin
HIPPOCRATEACEAE.
FLOW. PL. AFR.
Pl. 83.
J. Fleischmann del.