490 CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM. 
up to 10 em. long. Pistillate flowers with stout peduncles 6 to 7 em. long; 
Staminodia not seen; ovary ovoid-cylindric, pubescent, 4.5 cm. long; style 
2.5 cm. long, erect, glabrous; stigmas 3, distinct at the base, connivent at the 
apex and expanded into broad spreading subentire lobes. 
Fruit indehiscent, ovoid, stipitate, glabrous, orange-yellow with lighter stripes 
and lines without, 12 to 15 em. long, 7 to 9 em. in diameter, the stipe 1.5 to 2 
cm. long, 1.5 cm. thick, the peduncles thick, glabrous, up to 8 cm. long; seeds 
numerous, immersed in a copious watery white pulp, depressed, brownish with 
dark spots, 1 cm. long, about 5 mm. broad at the middle and not over 2 mm, 
thick, subnaviculiform, with one end subacute and narrow, the other broad 
and rounded. 
Type in the U. S. National Herbarium, no. 987505, collected at the forest edge, 
upper slopes of Cotiza, near Caracas, Venezuela, altitude 1,400 to 1,700 meters,. 
flowers and fruits, in September and November, 1917, by H. Pittier (no, 7381). 
Also collected in the same region, in staminate flower (Pittier 7571). 
The fruits of this species, which are called “ parcha de culebra,” are rather 
ornamental. The pericarp turns hard at maturity. When the pulp surrounding 
the seeds is eaten, it tastes at first very sweet but later produces in the mouth and 
digestive canal an intense and painful burning sensation, accompanied by nausea 
and a rapid rise of temperature. 
EXPLANATION OF PLATES 27-30.—Calycophysum brevipes Pittier. Natural size. 
