Stapelia. | ASCLEPIADEZ (Brown). 945 
obtuse, concave down the face, dark purple-brown ; inner corona- 
lobes with the dorsal wing shortly adnate at its base to the inner 
horn, the free part oblong or deltoid-oblong, toothed at the apex, 
erectly spreading, dark purple-brown ; inner horns connivent-erect 
with recurved-hooked tips, triquetrous-subulate, longer than the 
dorsal wings, yellowish, dotted with purple-brown. Willd. Sp. Pl. 
1278, and Enum. Pl. Hort. Berol. 281; Kerner, Hort. Semp. i. 89, and 
Ie. Pl. Sel. t. 3; Pers. Syn. Pl. i. 278; Poir. Encyel. vii. 378-; R. 
Br. in Mem. Wern. Soc. i. 24; Hornem. Hort. Hafn. i. 248 ; Haw. 
Syn. Pl. Succ. 17 ; Schultes, Syst. Veg. vi. 14; Link, Enum. Pl. Hort. 
Berol. i. 254 ; G. Don, Gen. Syst. iv. 114; Decne in DC. Prodr. viii. 
652, eael. reference to Loddiges and Jacquin partly. 8S. sororia, var. 
alia, Jacq. Stap. t. 58. 8. uncinata, Jacq. Stap., Synop. Stap. and 
Disp. Tab. ; Schlechter in Journ. Bot. 1898, 483. S. lunata, Sweet, 
Hort. Brit. ed. 2, 357. 
South Arrica: without locality, Masson. 
I have not seen this species and very little appears to be known concerning it. 
Masson states that it flowered in his garden at Cape Town in 1792 and at Kew in 
1797, but it is not mentioned in Aiton’s Hortus Kewensis. Haworth in 1812 
merely copies Masson’s diagnosis without any additional observation, so he 
probably never saw the plant, the specimen named S. sororia in his Herbarium 
is S. Massoni and is dated 1832. Jacquin devotes 3 plates to S. sororia, and 
under pl. 57 states that he has three plants under that name; those figured 
on pl. 56 and 57 are certainly not S, sororia, Masson, but represent two forms 
of S, hirsuta, var. patula, N. E. Br., whilst pl. 58 in its stout stems, lax habit 
and the corolla-lobes marked to their tips with transverse yellow lines agrees fairly 
well with the plant figured by Masson, who, however, has figured the more or — 
less compressed stems with broadly rounded angles, but no reliance can be placed 
upon the accuracy of his figure. Willdenow knew the plant, and it is quite clear 
that his citation, ‘‘ Stapeliz sorori# varietas, Jacq. Stap.” must refer to pl. 58 
of Jacq. Stap. and not to pl. 57, as Jacquin and others have supposed. The hairs 
upon the disk of the corolla are badly indicated by Jacquin by a few minute 
black lines, so that they are probably erect and not very evident unless viewed 
sideways, as is also the case in S. ambigua and some other species. 
10. 8. grandiflora (Masson, Stap. 13, t. 11); stems 6-12 in. high, 
1-1} in. square, with very compressed angles and deeply trough- 
shaped sides, prominently toothed, with incurved-erect rudimentary 
leaves 1-2 lin. long, minutely velvety-pubescent; flowers 1-3 
together near the base of the stems, successively developed ; 
pedicels 2—1 in. long, stout ; sepals 34—5 lin. long, lanceolate, acute, 
and together with the pedicels velvety-pubescent ; corolla in bud 
ovoid, acute, when expanded 5-6 in. in diam., flat or the lobes 
recurving and 1}-24 in. long, 1-1} in. broad, ovate-lanceolate, 
acute, not recurved or revolute at the margins, rather minutely 
velvety-pubescent on the back ; inner face dark purple-brown, with- 
out any markings, darkest on the erect glabrous and transversely 
rugose apical half of the lobes, densely and softly villous with long 
erect purple hairs on the disk and basal half of the lobes and ciliate 
_to their tips with long simple whitish or pale purple hairs, half of 
them directed inwards ; outer corona-lobes ascending-spreading, 3-4 
‘VOL. IV.—SECT. 1.—PART VI. 3 P 
