— 267 — 



,,A small stunted, much-branched bush that usually does not exceed 

 „two feet in height. It is frequently met with in Darjeeling, Kumaon, 

 „Kangra, the Nilghiri hills, and some parts of Upper Assam, but, curiously 

 „enough, is but indifferentiy represented in Chinese collections 



„ Branches al! straight, ascending, very leafy. Leaves small, linear, 

 ..smooth, thick, leathery in texture, inconspicuously reticulated, rigidly 

 „ascending in attitude, and rarely possessed of more than eight, sometimes 

 „only six or even only four, primary veins. In length they average from 

 „one to two or two and a half inches, and in breadth half to a little 

 „under one inch [i.e., 25-60 mM. by 10-20 mM.]. But in extrême cases 

 „the bushes and leaves may be considerably smaller. In the Kew Herbarium 

 „there is a seedling . . . . , the whole plant only four to six inches in 

 „height, stem, branches, and roots included, but the while copiously 

 „branched. The leaves do not exceed half an inch in length and one- 

 „quarter in breadth ^). 



„ln var. strida the under surface of the leaf is seen to be copiously 

 ..besprinkied with the exceedingly minute scale-like structures already 

 „spoken of under var. Bohea. In fact this peculiarity so unerringly sepa- 

 „rates thèse two plants from ail the other races of tea that it makes one 

 „hesitate to accept either as being hybrids from the larger-leaved forms." 



1 may hère put in the remark that the author's diagnoses cannot 

 convince me of the necessity of separating the varieties Bohea and stricta. 

 If from the alleged Bohea-spec\mens those which exhibit a vigorous, 

 „hybrid" growth, are excluded, such as we meet with in India and Java 

 but not in China, the remaining material does come from a „small stunted 

 bush" growing in China, just as Watt's var. strkia, and it certainly has 

 no greater number of veins than the latter. Moreover, both varieties, as 

 Watt himself observes, are possessed of those yellow stomata, which 

 appear to characterise their exsiccated leaves. 



The fourth and last variety is described in the foUowing terms: 



„Var. Jlasiocalyx. -) 



„A small bush copiously branched and clothed with many small 

 „linear-oblong (or obovate), acute cuneate leaves, about one to two inches 

 Jn length. and half an inch in diameter [i.e., 25-50 mM. by 12 mM.J; 

 „thick, fleshy, of a pale lemon-green colour when dry, almost quite glab- 

 „rous, except a few shaggy hairs near the midrib on the under surface, 

 ,,and with the minute, scale-like shining points below (described in con- 

 ,,nection with vars. Bohea and stricta) very abundant. Inflorescence axillary, 

 ,,crowded on the erect young shoots in the form of umbellate clusters of 

 ..three to five flowers, pedicels very short, but with two or three scales 



') Obviously such dwarfy forms were designated by MiQUEL with the name var. par. 



vifolia (1867, p. 17, cf. this chapter, p. 253). 

 For this variety we are referred to thèse herbarium saiiiples: Thea lasiocalyx Plan- 



CHON MS (recorded on a sheet in Wallichs Herb. at Linii. Soc. also Kew Herb.); 



T. viridis \^ma.., Cat. n. 979; but in Wall., Herb., at the Linn. Suc. n. 979 consists 



of two spécimens — one said to be from Singapore; the other from Penang. 



