18 I K T R O D U C T I O N .
The species of the fourth section {Cydohalamis) are all Asiatic; but only fourteen of them
enter into the Indo-Malayan flora. The fifth and sixth {GhUmydohalaniis and Lithocarpus)
are small sections, and the species, being mostly Indo-Malayan, fall to be described in
this monograph, in which I attempt to do for the species of Quercus and Castanopsis
which belong to this flora what Michaux and Liebmann did for the oaks of America,
and what Kotschy did for those of Europe and the Levant. Many of the species treated
of in the following pages have already been excellently described by M. A. De Candolle
in the Prodromus and by Sir Joseph Hooker in the Flora of British India; while some
of them have not only been described, but have been admirably figured by Blume,
Korthals, and Oudemanns. And it is not with the remotest intention of dispai-aging the
work of these high authorities that I here issue new descriptions and drawings of these
species, but simply because I believe it may bo useful to working botanists to be
provided, in a single volume easy of acquisition, with a complete series of descriptions
and figm-es not only of all the species desci'ibed in Sir Joseph Hooker's Flora of Britiah
India, but of those also which have not as yet been collected beyond the limits of
Dutch India.
Between the genera Queráis and Castanoiysis the difEerenccs appear to me to be not only
slight, but rather arbitrary; and I see no good reason why every Castanopsis described below
should not be put into section Chlampdohalanus of the genus Quercus. But as genera and
species are after all but conveniences for study, it seems undesirable to disturb the
arrangement by which a number of species with prickly or tubercular involucres completely
enveloping the nuts and splitting ii-regularly to let them escape are separated off under the
generic name Castannpsis. The arrangement has the sanction of high authority, and it has
been hallowed by time. To upset it would add something to an already too heavy
synonymy, and it therefore appears best to let it stand. Except one, which is American,
the species of Castanopsis are Asiatic, and the majority are Indo-Malayan.
QUERCUS, LINN. Gen. No. 1070.
Monoiceous trees or shrubs with evergreen or deciduous, alternate, penni-nerved
leaves. Flowers small or minute, bracteolate; the males in pendulous or erect spikes
or panicles; the females in erect, unisexual or androgynous spikes. Male flower ; perianth
-with 4—7 segments (usually with 6); stamens 6 to 12, filaments slender, anther-cells
parallel, dehiscing suturally; pistillode hairy or Q.—Female flower enclosed in an involucre
of imbricate scales, the perianth urceolate, the tube adherent to the ovary, the limb
minute-lobed, staminodes small or absent; ovaiy inferior, after fecundation more or less
completely 3-celled (rarely 4- or 5-celled), the cells 2-ovulate; styles 3-5, short. Rijie
nut or glans ovoid, globose or tm-binate, 1-celled, surrounded by the accrescent cupuliform
involucre which embraces more or less of its lower half, or the whole of it; the involucral
scales hardened into teeth or spines or coalesced into zones. Nut attached to the woody
involucre by its base only or adnate by its sides also; its pericarp crustaceous, rarely
coriaceous or osseous. Seeds 1 or 2, with membranous testa; the cotyledons fleshy,
plano-convex, sometimes lobed or ruminate; radicle minute.
CONSPECTUS OF THE SECTIONS OF THE GENUS.
Section /. Lepidobalanus.—líale spikes simple, slender, lax, pendulous; involucres
of fruit cup-shaped, the apices of the scales free, imbricate, solitary, sub-sessile, usually
in short spikes; leaves dentate or lobed.
Section II. Cyclobalanopsis.—llaU spikes pendulous and otherwise as in Lepidoialanus.
Involucres forming a cupule the bracts of which are united to form concentric
lanuna3 or zones with entire, crenate, or denticulate edges; leaves dentate or serrate,
never entii'e.
Section III Pasaw/a.—Male spikes erect, simple or paniclcd, female flowers in short
distinct spikes or at the base of some of the male panicles; involucres solitary or in
groups of three, cup-shaped, saucer-shaped, or discoid; the bracts imbricate, free, or
united by their bases only, the apices always free; leaves entire.
Section IV. Cyclobalanus—llaXe spikes erect; styles and leaves as in Fasania;
involucres cupulate, solitary, or in threes; their bracts connate into entire or denticulate
lamellaj as in Ctjelohalanopsis ; leaves entire.
ANN. ROY, BOT. GARD. CALCUTTA, VOL. II,