dwarf in stature, and sub-erect in habit ; but the cultivated 

 plant shows a tendency to twining, insomuch as some of 

 the branches twine around each other. It is possible that 

 it has lost the twining habit so common in the Asclepia- 

 clacese through changes in environment in some of the 

 districts where it has been collected. 



Descr. — A. perennial, woody plant, with a dwarf, thick 

 stock, which produces annual (sometimes perennial ?) 

 flowering stems of sub-erect or twining habit. Stems one 

 to three feet long, pubescent ; internodes usually shorter 

 than the leaves, at least in the wild specimens. Leaves 

 petiolate, soft and papery in texture, very variable in out- 

 line, from oval to oblong or ovate, mostly from one and a 

 half to three inches long, acuminate, or rounded at both 

 ends, more or less hairy, especially along the veins 

 on the under surface. Cymes or false umbels solitary 

 at the joints, shortly stalked, five- to fifteen-flowered, 

 pubescent; bracts very small. Flowers purple-red, six 

 to eight lines in diameter, pendulous on slender pedi- 

 cels. Calyx pubescent ; segments linear-lanceolate, acute, 

 about two lines long. Corolla campanulate, puberulous ; 

 lobes deltoid, acute, somewhat shorter than the tube, at 

 length recurved. Coronal scales five, small, gland-like, 

 adnate to the middle of the staminal-tube. Stamens 

 attached to the base of the corolla ; filaments connate in a 

 tube. Anthers erect ; pollen-masses solitary in each cellj 

 with slender caudicles. Fruit unknown. — W. B. H. 



Fig. 1, an unexpanded flower; 2, corona and gynseceum; 3, pollinia : 

 enlarged. 



