228 CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM. 
DESCRIPTIONS OF THE COLOMBIAN GENERA AND SPECIES. 
CATOBLASTEAE. 
SYNOPTICAL KEY TO THE GENERA. 
Pistillate flowers with three equal carpels at the time of 
flowering .......---2...-- 0... e eee eee eee eee ACROSTIGMA (p. 228). 
Pistillate flowers with one greatly enlarged fertile carpel 
at the time of flowering. 
Petals not imbricate; stigma sessile at the base of the 
long, cylindrical fertile carpel................ CaTOSTIGMA (p. 230). 
Petals imbricate at base; stigma rostrate or borne on 
a columnar Style......-..................2.... CATOBLASTUS (p. 231). 
ACROSTIGMA gen. nov. 
Trunk solitary, rather short (6 meters long) not so thick below (10 em.) as 
above (16 cm.) ; smooth, distinctly ringed; internodes short (10 em.) 
Leaves with rather short sheaths (120 cm. long) ; pinne triangular-lanceolate, 
not inserted on a fleshy pulvinus; petiole short (16 to 18 cm. long); segments 
of unequal length, united; both surfaces smooth; terminal pinns broad, united 
to near the end. 
Spathes 5 or 6, two or three of them small, basal, three large. 
Spadix compound, divided near the middle into several (about 5) long, taper- 
ing, flexuous branches; female inflorescence bearing irregularly scattered flowers 
each subtended by 2 minute rudiments of male flowers; female flowers with 
sepals rounded-triangular, broader than long, slightly connate at base; petals 
triangular, nearly as broad as long, less than twice as long as the sepals, dis- 
tinctly separated at base, soft and fleshy in texture, not ribbed on the back; 
staminodes 6, minute, delicate, of soft texture, less than one-fourth the length 
of the sepals; pistil triangular with three equal lobes, not exceeding the petals; 
stigmas completely sessile, forming a minute 3-pointed slit in the apex of the 
pistil. 
Fruit elliptical, slightly compressed and slightly angled on one side above the 
stigma, one and one-half times as long as broad. Stigmas persistent at base, 
close to the persistent calyx; sepals united at base, one much larger than the 
other two; mesocarp of rather loose, corky, granular texture, composed of 
coarse cellular tissue and coarse, irregular fibres, often spine-like; inner surface 
of mesocarp closely and ebscurely wrinkled without evident indication of a 
fibrous network as in Catostigma; numerous bundles of raphids imbedded in 
the mesocarp immediately around the inner surface; endocarp rather thick and 
corky, covered with a very close network of rather coarse, strongly flexuous 
fibres. 
Seed compressed-oval, smooth or very faintly impressed under the fibres of 
the endocarp; albumen uniform; embryo basal, extremely small, not covered 
by the albumen, indicated by a minute rounded prominence on the outer wall 
of the very small cavity. . 
Type species, Acrostigma equale. 
Distinguished from Catoblastus Wendl. in having the pistil formed of three 
equal carpels with minute sessile stigmas, and by the presence of rudimentary 
male flowers in the female inflorescences. 
Acrostigma equale sp. nov. PLATE 54 (A), 55, 56 (A), 57, 5s. 
Trunk 6 meters long by 10 cm. in diameter at 1 meter from base, becoming 
thicker toward the crown, there reaching » diameter of 16 cm.; internodes 
10 cm, or Jess in length. 
