the latter tied up in bundles and placed under protection 

 to be planted in the following year. The leaves and stems 

 reserved for dye-making are thrown into a water-tank, 

 where they partially decompose. Lime is then added, and 

 the watery infusion well mixed by beating the surface with 

 bamboo rakes. From greenish the fluid becomes yellow, 

 with a bright blue froth. A few drops of cabbage oil are 

 thrown on this froth, which thereupon immediately dis- 

 appears, and the colouring matter sinks to the bottom as a 

 thick paste, which is collected and dried for the markets. 



As with so many other plants yielding useful products, 

 8. flaccidifolius has received many names, in this case mul- 

 tiplied by the fact of its having an extended geographical 

 distribution, from Bengal eastwards through Assam and 

 Burma to South China, and which has led to its being 

 differently named in India and Hongkong. It further 

 belongs to an immense genus, numbering upwards of 120 

 species, which are exceedingly difficult to recognize from 

 descriptions alone. The Strobilanthes flaccidifolius was sent 

 to Kew from Hongkong by Mr. Ford, where it appears to 

 be indigenous, though scarce, and where its identity with 

 the Indian and northern Chinese dye-yielding plant was 

 not recognized. 



Desce. A glabrous shrub, four to five feet high, branched 

 from the base ; branches herbaceous, erect, smooth, green, 

 minutely hoary. Leaves two to five inches long, quite 

 glabrous, narrowed into a petiole half to one inch long, 

 ovate- or elliptic-lanceolate, acuminate, serrate, bright 

 green above, bluish-green beneath. Flowers in spikes or 

 panicles, or reduced to two opposite and terminal ; bracts 

 leaf-like, half to one inch long, subspathulate, obtuse, 

 caducous ; bracteoles like the calyx-segments. Calyx half 

 an inch long, puberulous ; four sepals linear, subacute, 

 dorsal longer and twice as broad. Corolla two inches long, 

 pale lilac-purple ; tube broadly funnel-shaped, bent below 

 the middle; lobes five, equal, short, broad, two-lobed. 

 Stamens four, filaments short ; anthers linear-oblong. 

 Ovary glabrous, except at the tip; style very slender, 

 puberulous ; stigma entire, curved.— J. D. E. 



Fig. 1, Calyx and style; 2, tube of corolla and stamens; 3 and 4, antbers; 5, 

 ovary and disk ; 6, vertical section of the same -.—all enlarged. 



