26 CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM. 
about the middle and usually one at the base; flowers large, borne on branches; 
outer petals erect, broadly cordate-ovate, acute or acutish, more than 25 mm. 
long, thick, valvate, greenish white or pale yellow, clothed on the outside with 
minute silky white hairs (visible under the microscope) ; inner petals about 
half as large as and thinner than the outer, connivent over the essential parts, 
imbricate; torus densely rufous-villous; stamens closely crowded, the swollen 
terminal heads of the connectives minutely muriculate like those of A. muricata; 
carpels distinct, with the linear pistils clothed with appressed pale rufous 
sericeous hairs; fruit ovate-globose, conoid (turbinate), ovoid-oblong, or spheroid, 
tomentose at first, at length glabrate, muricate with fleshy prickles very much 
as in Annona muricata, but these smaller and sometimes almost wanting or at 
length broken off, green at first but usually brownish at length; pulp when imma- 
ture white, at length yellowish and soft, with the odor of fermenting dough and 
with an unpleasant taste; seeds yellow or light tan color to chestnut, smooth 
and glossy, obovate-oblong, compressed, marginate, 12 to 24 mm. long, by 8 to 12 
mm. broad, enveloped when fresh in a thin white membrane. (PLATES 9, 10.) 
This species was based by Martius upon the descriptions of Piso and Marc- 
grave of the Brazilian “ aratici ponhé.” 1 
DisrriputTion: Brazil, Province of Minas, near Bahia and Pernambuco, to 
French and Dutch Guiana and Venezuela. 
SPECIMENS EXAMINED: 
Braziz: Bahia, “in sabulosis maritimis, an sponte ? Arbor 10 pedalis, 
trunci diameter pedalis,” 1880, Salzmann 5 (Herb. De Candolle) ; with- 
out definite locality Sellow (Berlin Herb. 6). 
VENEZUELA: Sacupana, lower Orinoco River, April, 1896, Rusby & Squires 
100 (U. S. Nat. Herb. no. 325549; Herb. Phila, Acad. Sci.); near 
Caracas, March, 1913, Pittier 5855 (with photographs of leaves, 
unopened flower, and fruit). 
LocaAL NAMES: Aratici ponhé (Brazil) ; Guanébana cimarrona (Venezuela) ; 
Corossol sauvage (French Guiana). 
The “aratici ponhé” of Brazil was first described in 1648 by Piso and 
Marcgrave, together with the ‘“aratici apé,” which differs from it in having 
dark-colored instead of yellow seeds. The resemblances of both these species to 
the “ guanibana,” or soursop (Annona nuricata L.), was pointed out; but these 
authors were apparently unfamiliar with the latter species, described under the 
name “ guanabanus” by Oviedo, whose description they repeat at length. The 
aratici apé was supposed to be identical with Oviedo’s “ guanabanus,” by 
Plukenet, who published an accurate figure of its leaves.” Martius, however, 
bases a distinct species upon it, which he calls Anona pisonis, in honor of Piso, 
though he never saw a specimen of the plant nor of its fruit. Martius also 
erroneously refers to the A. muricata of Linneus the A, muricata of Velloso, 
which was undoubtedly the aratici ponhé, or wild soursop, as is shown by the 
conspicuous pits in the axils of the lateral nerves of the leaves.* These exist in 
the leaves of the cultivated soursop (A. muricata L.), but are so minute as to 
be almost imperceptible to the naked eye. 
Upon the aratict ponhé, as described by Piso and Marcgrave, Martius bases 
his Anona marcgravii, which is so closely allied to the wild soursop of the 
West Indian Islands (A. montana Macfad.) that it may, perhaps, be regarded 
as a form of that species. If the two prove to be specifically identical, the name 
’ Piso, Med. Bras. 69. 1648. Maregr. Hist. Nat. Bras. in Piso, Med. Bras. 93. 
(fig.) 1648. 
* Pluk. Phytogr. 4: pl. 134. f. 2. 1769. 
* Vell. Fl. Flum. 5: pl. 126. 1827, 
