Thonningia.| CXXI, BALANOPHORE (BOTTING HEMSLEY). 437 
times obsolete. Stamens 3-5, or perhaps sometimes more, united in 
a column; anthers normally 2-celled, sometimes imperfect, or more or 
less embedded in the column, dehiscing longitudinally ; cells sometimes 
irregular in number, length and height; pollen subglobose. Receptacle 
usually bracteolate. Female flowers very small and very numerous, 
occupying the whole head or surrounded by one or more series of male 
flowers, often exceeding 10,000 in a head. Perianth adherent, pro- 
duced in a cylindrical tube above the ovary, 2—5-lobed ; lobes unequal, 
forming an oblique limb, or equal or almost obsolete. Ovary inferior, 
1-celled, cylindrical ; style exserted, about the same length as the ovary, 
filiform or capillary; ovule solitary, ‘Fruit compound, fleshy, highly 
coloured, strongly resembling a strawberry in external appearance, 
sometimes as much as 2 in. in diam. Seed imperfectly known; not 
present in any of the specimens examined.—Herbs parasitic on the 
roots of trees or shrubs, perennial, forming tubers at the points of 
attachment to the host and emitting more or less branched cylindrical 
usually hairy rhizomes, bearing sessile or more or less pedunculate 
flower heads; fleshy or coriaceous, destitute of chlorophyll, but brightly 
or brilliantly coloured. Leaves none. Peduncles densel y clothed with 
imbricating rigid sharp-pointed scales. Heads solitary ; involucral 
scales similar to and continuous with those on the peduncles. 
Species 6, all endemic. 
Thonningia, excluding 7. malagasica, Fawcett (Trans. Linn. Soc. ser. 2, 
Bot. ii. 239, ¢. 36) is restricted to tropical Africa. The floral structure of the 
Madagascar plant is so different that a revision of the whole order would probably 
lead to giving it generic rank. In some respects the flowers are more like those of 
some of the species placed in Balanophora itself ; the males having a regular perianth 
enclosing the staminal column, and the females being destitute of a style which is a 
conspicuous feature in Thonningia. 
tichler, in DC. Prodr. xvii, 141, describes the male flowers of Thouningia as 
pedicellate; but as some of the lobes of the imperfect perianth are sometimes given 
off near the base of this axis, or are easily detached to its base, it seems more 
consistent to treat it as a part of the staminal column. 
Hitherto botanists, with the exception of Prof. Lecomte, the author of 7’. sessilis, 
have referred all the specimens of Thonningia that have come under their observation 
to the original 7’. sanguinea. Thus in Engler (Pfl. Ost-Afr. C. 169) and Durand 
(Sylloge Flore Congolane, 476) and in the herbaria consulted all the specimens were 
under this name ; but excellent specimens in alcohol at Kew, collected by Monteiro 
in Angola, and by Dawe in Uganda, at once suggested plurality of species, which was 
confirmed by examination. Mrs. Talbot’s excellent coloured drawings at the British 
Museum, the only ones seen, were a great help, though unfortunately the specimens 
drawn were attacked by insects before being put into spirit and the male flowers, 
especially, almost entirely destroyed. Possibly segregation has been carried too far 5 
but it was considered better to err in this direction rather than confuse two species 
under one name. Complete specimens of both sexes are much needed. The tubers 
of most of the species are unknown, and no information concerning the host-plant 1s 
forthcoming. Ripe seed is wanting in all the specimens examined, except the 
doubtful 7. malagasica, 
We are indebted to Dr. A. B. Rendle for facilities for comparing the British 
Museum material with that at Kew. 
