Ocotea. | CXVI. LAURINEE (STAPF). 187 
1. O. usambarensis, Hngl. in Abh. Preuss. Akad. Wiss. (1894), 
51,54; PA. Ost-Afr. C. 182. A tree up to 130 ft. high; trunk up to 
11} ft. in diam.; branchlets softly and spreadingly pubescent to. 
tomentose or with the exception of the youngest parts glabrous and 
then drying blackish. Leaves rather crowded, alternate, subopposite 
or opposite, broad-elliptic, obtuse at both ends, margins of the young 
leaves more or less revolute, 2-24 in. long, 14-12 in. broad, thinly 
coriaceous, somewhat bullate, whitish or glaucous below, softly hairy on 
both sides when young, glabrescent above and sometimes also below, 
but less completely so; midrib narrow above, broader and raised 
below ; lateral nerves 5-7, spreading or oblique, often forking, sunk 
above, raised below, venation irregular, fine, quite obscure above ; 
petiole 2-5 lin. long, terete, finely channelled above, more or less 
tomentose or pubescent. Panicles from the axils of the uppermost 
leaves, subcorymbose, fulvous- or greyish-hairy all over, 4-1 in. long, 
lin. wide, on slender peduncles 1-2 in, long; bracts ovate, obtuse, 
densely pubescent, up to over 1 lin. long, very early deciduous; 
pedicels very short to 1 lin. long. Perianth densely pubescent to 
tomentellous without, 23-3 lin. across when quite open; receptacle 
turbinate, about ? lin. high, hairy within ; segments spreading, about. 
1$ lin. long, the outer elliptic-oblong, inner broad-ovate, all obtuse, 
pubescent within, particularly the outer. Stamens of the herma- 
phrodite flowers with linear filaments, as long as the anthers and very 
. finely pubescent or the inner glabrous on the back ; glands shortly but 
distinctly stalked, subglobose, inserted on each side of the base of the: 
stamens of the third whorl; staminodes about 3 lin. long, filiform, with 
a dark gland-like tip ; stamens and staminodes of the female very much 
reduced. Ovary immersed, but free, in the receptacle, ovoid, like the 
slender style glabrous; stigma discoid. Fruit globose or ellipsoid- 
globose, 4-5 lin. long, borne on the upward-thickened pedicel and 
seated in the enlarged cupular receptacle, 2 lin. across and almost 
1 lin. deep. Testa crustaceous. 
Nile Land. British East Africa: forests on Mount Kenia and the Aberdare 
Range, Hutchins ! Battiscombe, 16! 
Mozamb. Dist. German East Africa: Usambara; Silai, Holst, 1301! 
An account of this very valuable timber tree was given by Mr. D. E. Hutchins. 
in Colonial Reports—Miscellaneous, No. 41, 1907, 18, under the name of Ibean 
camphor or mozaiti (Kikuyu). Seedlings and root-suckers referred to the 
“ mozaiti’? were communicated by Mr. Hutchinson and Mr. Battiscombe. The 
seedlings and the root-suckers are, apart from the terminal buds, almost entirely 
glabrous, but the tomentum of the buds is of the same kind as in the adult plant. 
The leaves of the suckers and the youngest seedlings are papery, 3-5 in. long and 
13-2 in. wide, oblong to oblong-lanceolate, and more or less acutely acuminate. 
Those of the older seedlings are broad-elliptic, and 3-6 in. by 2-34 in., and their 
reticulation is very marked on the upper side. An older branch, collected at 
Karoris, in the Aberdare Forest, is also glabrous, but has the coriaceous irregu- 
larly veined leaves of tke flowering specimens described above. According to 
a communication by Professor Engler, similar variations occur in the Usambara 
Mountains. 
