OF ARTS AND SCIENCES : SEPTEMBER 11, 1866. 205 



genus, under the name of F. arborea. It is, however, never known 

 to grow upright, but climbs over and among trees, making a dense 

 tangle, and is expressively named by the natives i-e - i-e, i-e mean- 

 ing to step over. Possibly Gaudichaud may have been misled by plants 

 growing over the Draccena aurea, and have mistaken the two plants 

 for one, the leaves being somewhat similar ; but his specific name, how- 

 ever ill-chosen, could not now well be superseded. Hooker & Arnott, 

 having scandent specimens destitute of flower and fruit, unfortunately 

 referred them to F. scandens, Gaud. 1. c, of Molucca and Timor, a 

 species with a single small stigma, and in other respects totally different 

 from the Hawaiian one, which has a clavate ovary with a truncate apex 

 bearing 5 to 7 stigmas. This has created a confusion in all subsequent 

 works, which even Kurtz, with Gaudichaud's figures before him, has 

 failed to clear up in his recent monograph of the genus (in Seem. Journ. 

 Bot. 5, p. 133). So far from the species " not existing in nature," it 

 is one of the two species upon which Gaudichaud founded the genus, 

 and differs much from F. scandens. (M. & B.) 



Aroidece. 



470.* COLOCASIA ANTIQUORUM, var. ESCTJLENTA, Schott. — 



The natives distinguish a great number of varieties, some of which 

 yield a much better esculent than others. There is a form which 

 grows high up in mountain valleys, known as apii, which has very 

 large leaves and a small and useless corm. The cultivation of the halo 

 is carried on mostly, if not exclusively, by planting the top of the corm 

 (sliced off with the bases of the leaves adhering) usually in artificial 

 ponds : but where there are no surface streams, it is carefully mulched. 



Taccacece. 



471. Tacca pinnatifida, Forster, Gen. PI. Ins. Aust. t. 35 ; See- 

 mann, Journ. Bot. 3, p. 261. T. oceanica, Nutt. in Amer. Journ. 

 Pharmac. 9, with a plate. 



NaiadacecB. 



472. Najas major, All., var. angustifolia, A. Braun, in Seem. 

 Journ. Bot. 2, p. 275. 



473. Ruppia maritima, Linn. First detected by Chamisso. 



474. Potamogeton Gaudiohatjdii, Cham, in Linnsea, 2, p. 199. 



475. Potamogeton fluitans, var. Owaihiensis, Cham, in Lin- 

 naja, 2, p. 228. 



