Xyris. | CXLII, XYRIDEA (BROWN). 25. 
of the Cuanza River, near Buinba, Welwitsch, 2460! Huilla ; Humpata, in spongy 
marshes at the foot of the Sierra de Oiahoia, Welwitsch, 2475! 
Mozamb. Dist. (erman East Africa and the region around Lake Nyasa, ex 
Engler. British Central Africa : Nyasaland ; Shire Highlands, Buchanan ! Mount 
Maloxa, 4000-6000 ft., Whyte! Mount Zomba, 4000-6000 ft., Whyte / 
Also in Madagascar. 
This Tropical African plant differs from the typical Madagascar form in that the 
peduncles are more slender, and the cilia on the keels of the lateral sepals have a 
tendency to be grouped in tufts, instead of being evenly spread as in typical X. Hil- 
debrandtii, but in other respects the two plants closely agree. X. Umbilonis, Nilss., 
under which Rendle has placed it, differs in having the keel of the lateral sepals 
produced at the apex, but may, perhaps, only be a local form: it was collected in Natal. 
X. Hildebrandtii is distinguished from all other Tropical African species, by its dull 
blackish-brown many-flowered spikes, and distinctly ciliate sepuls. 
Imperfectly known species, 
32. ¥. minima, Steud. Syn. Pl. Glum. ii. 288. Roots fibrous, very 
slender. Peduncular-sheath lax, terminated by a flattish or setaceous 
leafy point 3-5 lin. long. Peduncle 14-3 in. long, capillary or filiform, 
Spike small. Bracts ovate-oblong, obtuse, pale chestnut-brown. 
Lateral sepals lanceolate-spathulate.—X. humilis, var. minima, Nilss. 
in Ofvers. Vet. Akad. Férhandl. Stockh. 1891, 152; and’in Svensk. Vet. 
Akad. Handl. xxiv., no. 14, 40; Durand & Schinz, Consp. Fl. Afr. 
v. 420. 
Upper Guinea. Los Islands, Jardin, 120, in Stockholm Herb. 
I have not seen a specimen of this plant, and the description is insufficient for its 
identification, but it would appear to be allied to X. straminea, Nilss., or X. filiformis, 
Lam. 
Orper CXLIII. COMMELINACEA. (By C. B. Clarke.) 
Flowers small, bisexual or some sterile. Sepals 3, one entirely 
external in the bud. Petals 3, free or their claws imperfectly united 
into a tube in Cyanotis. Stamens 6, whereof 4—1 are often sterile and 
deformed or wanting; filaments often with beaded hairs. Ovary 
superior, 3—2-celled ; when 3-celled the dorsal cell often smaller with 
fewer ovules or empty ; style simple; ovules 1 or several in each cell 
attached to the inner angle. Fruit (except in the two first small 
genera) a loculicidal capsule. Seeds having the hilum linear, vertical 
(except in the two first genera); embryo small, far from the hilum, 
shortly cylindric in the floury albumen; foramen prominent, covered 
by an embryostega, lateral (i.e. nearly opposite the hilum), except in 
Cyanotis.—Herbs. Leaves alternate, ovate to linear, bases sheathing. 
Species 330, in all warm countries. 
Mostly succulent weedy plants, with fugitive flowers. In some genera the flowers. 
are symmetric or nearly so ; but in the majority the flower is 1-sided, the dorsal cell 
of the ovary smaller or 0, the dorsal petal much shorter than the other two, and the 
3 dorsal stamens sterile or rudimentary. 
