428 CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE NATIONAL HERBARIUM, 
Type in the U. S. National Herbarium, no. 691286, collected between Quebrade 
del Bollo and El Platanel, on the trail from Rio Frio to San Andrés de la 
Sierra, State of Magdalena, Colombia, altitude about 1,000 meters, July, 1906, 
by H. Pittier (no. 1692). 
A very distinct species, related to D. ciliata, but distinguished by its abundant 
pubescence, pale leaves, densely capitate inflorescence of numerous small spike- 
lets, and pale achenes. 
Dichromena ebracteata Standley, sp. nov, 
Perennial from a slender dark brown creeping rhizome; leaves numerous, thin, 
flat, bright green on the upper surface or sometimes glaucous, glaucous be- 
neath, 8 to 16 cm. long, about 2.5 to 5 mm. wide, dilated at the base and 
ciliate, elsewhere finely pubescent with spreading or somewhat appressed hairs 
or glabrate; culms very slender, 6 to 20 em. high, usually shorter than the 
longer leaves but sometimes longer, finely villous or glabrous; bracts repre- 
sented by 1 or 2 subulate-lanceolate green membraceous-margined scales 2 mm, 
long or less; spikelets 8 to 8, subspicate, sessile or one of them short-pedunculate, 
5 to 10 mm. long; scales of the spikelets nearly white, thin, glabrous, oblong, 
obtuse, often emarginate, keeled; style linear, with elongated branches; achenes 
broadly obovoid, 1 mm. long, yellowish green, finely rugulose with faint trans- 
verse undulate lines, the beak one-third as long, white, thin. 
Type in the U. 8. National Herbarium, no. 692624, collected in Lot 42, Island 
of Tobago, along banks, April 21, 1918, by W. E. Broadway (no. 4455). 
ADDITIONAL SPECIMENS EXAMINED: 
Topaco: Forest Reserve, above Caledonia, Broadway 3071. 
VENEZUELA: El Valle, Island of Margarita, Miller & Johnston 190. 
Dichromena ebracteata is as closely related to D. ciliata Vahl as to any 
species, but from this and all others heretofore described it may be distin- 
guished by the abortive involucral bracts, these being much shorter than the 
spikelets. The Venezuelan specimen was distributed as Dichromena leucocephala 
Michx. (D. colorata (.) Hitche,), a species with which it has little in 
common, 
THE GENUS BISBOECKELERA. 
In 1842 Nees von Ksenbeck described in Martius’s Flora Brasil- 
iensis' a new genus of Cyperaceae, which he called Hoppia in honor 
of the German botanist Hoppe. Unfortunately, there was already a 
genus Hoppea of the Gentianaceae, dedicated by Willdenow in 1801? 
to a man of the same name. This was used in the form Hoppea by 
Sprengel in 1818.° Taking the proper view that Nees’s name should 
be replaced, Otto Kuntze in 1891+* suggested Bisboeckelera as a sub- 
stitute, and this name, although ill-formed, is the one that must be 
used. 
The genus consists of but few species, all from the western and 
northern parts of tropical South America. It was considered by 
Nees a member of the tribe Cariceae, while Bentham and Hooker® 
placed it in the Cryptangieae. Pax, in his treatment of the family 
in Engler and Prantl’s Natiirlichen Pflanzenfamilien,® associated 
*2?:199. pl. 30. *Rev. Gen. Pl. 2: 747. 
* Ges. Naturf. Freund. Berlin Mag. 3: 434. *Gen. Pl. 3: 1042. 1883. 
® Anleit. Gewiichs. 27: 889. ° 27: 119. 1887, 
