230 CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM. 
nodes of the old wood, the rachis slender, suberect, cano-pubescent, 8 to 10 em. 
long; flowers numerous, white, geminate, each pair subtended by a minute, 
ovate, scarious bract covered with red hairs; pedicels free, cano-pubescent, 
1.5 to 2 mm. long; sepals linear, 3-nerved, 7.5 nm. long, broader and rounded 
at the base, truncate at the apex, minutely and sparsely pubescent without ; 
stamens inserted on upper half of the sepals (4.5 mm. from base), glabrous, 
the filaments 0.5 to 0.6 mm. long, the anthers linear or oblong-linear, 8 mm. 
long; dise scales ovate or suborbicular, 0.5 to 0.6 mm. high; pistil 8 mm. long, 
the ovary ovoid, whitish-tomentellous, the style glabrous, clavate, 2-suleate. 
Type in the U. 8. National Herbarium, no. 676779, collected between El Corozal 
and Ancén, Canal Zone, Panama, in a swamp, flowers, February 2, 1911, by 
H. Pittier (no. 2680). 
Owing to the incompleteness of the descriptions of the known species of 
Roupala, it is very difficult to establish the relationship between the many 
members of the genus. The one just described belongs undoubtedly to the 
group designated by Meisner?! as section 2: “ Foliis dentatis vel passim inte- 
gerrimis ;” but it does not correspond to any of the descriptions under that 
head, being characterized by the cano-pubescent pedicels and rachis of the 
inflorescence, the white tomentellum of the ovary, the small reddish bract at 
the base of the pedicels, the hairiness at the base of the petioles, ete. It is 
apparently very closely related to a plant of Santa Marta (H. H. Smith 1918, 
1914), distributed under the names of R. gardneri Meisn.(?) and R. gardneri 
dentata DC,,? but in that the branchlets are stouter, the fioral spikes either axil- 
lary at the ends of short branchlets or forming large, terminal, branched 
panicles. The petioles and the length and texture of the leaves are also dis- 
tinct and the flowers not so slender and perhaps longer than in the Panama 
species. It is very doubtful whether the Santa Marta plant is the true 2. 
gardneri; as stated under R. darienensis, I do not think it is. When the range: 
of variation in the specific characters within this genus is better known, it is 
quite possible that forms that are kept apart for the present may be brought 
together under one name. 
AN IMPERFECTLY KNOWN SPECIES OF EMBOTHRIUM. 
Embothrium ruizii (Klotzsch) Pittier. 
Oreocallis ruizii Klotsch, Linnaea 20: 474, 1847, 
A bushy shrub, the branchlets at first grayish, rusty, or fulvous-tomentellous, 
glabrous later. Leaves subcoriaceous, bunched at the ends of the branchlets, the 
petioles grayish-tomentellous, 2 to 2.5 em. long, the blades oblong, attenuate at 
the base, rounded-emarginate at the apex, 5 to 9 cm, long, 2 to 4 em. broad, 
glabrous and subreticulate above with the costa and veins prominulous, glau- 
cous, sparsely pubescent, and reticulate beneath, the venation brownish, the 
costa prominent and subtomentellous. Inflorescence spicate, terminal, the 
rachis thick, brownish-tomentellous, about 4.5 em. long; flowers numerous, 
glabrous, whitish or pale greenish white; basal bract acute-triangular, hairy, 
about 3 mm. long; pedicels thick, about 1 em. long; perianth about 3.5 em. long, 
forming at the apex a 4-lobate head; anthers sessile, subacute, about 2 mm. 
long and broad, inserted inside of the concave lobes of the perianth ; dise lamella 
brownish, fleshy, half surrounding the base of the pistil; pistil about 4.7 em. 
long, the ovary stipitate, hardly thicker than the style, 1-celled, the ovules few, 
*In DC. Prodr, 14: 427, 1856-57. 
? Not De Candolle but Meisner is the author of this name, 
