110 SOUTH NIGERIAN PLANTS 
clavato ovarium aequante ; processubus stigmaticis satis conspicuis 
antherae canales subaequantibus; anthera pro flore magna. 
(Pl. 15, figs. 10, 11.) 
Oban; n. 774. Liberia, Gonyon, Bassa; R. H. Bunting, n. 33; 
** flowers white to greenish.” 
The Liberian specimens are taller and stouter than the Nigerian, 
reaching 4:6 dm. in height with a thickness of 3 mm., the large 
radical leaves 15 em. long (including the lax sheathing base) by 3 em. 
broad, the spike 9 cm. long. The Nigerian plants range from 
17-82 cm. long, with a slender stem 1-1:5 mm. thick, and radical 
leaves 6-10 cm. long and a shorter, laxer-flowered spike. Fertile 
bracts 12-18 mm. long. Dorsal sepal 5-6 mm. long, 2 mm. broad; 
lateral sepals 6-7°5 mm. long by 2:75-3 mm. broad. Petals 7 mm. 
long by *5 mm. broad; lip-segments 6-8 mm. long; spur 12 mm. 
long; stigmatic processes 1 mm. long. Anther 2 mm. long. 
Apparently (from the description) allied to H. physuriformis 
Krünzl. from the Cameroons, but a larger plant with larger flowers. 
Kränzlin (in Engl. Jahrb. xliii. 395) places this in his section Replicatae, 
though the petals are deseribed as undivided; it would seem more 
fitly placed in the section Tridactylae. 
Habenaria barrina Ridl. in Bolet. Soc. Brot. v. 202. Oban : 
n. 923. A single specimen which is of interest as the species has 
hitherto been known only from the Island of St. Thomas. By 
some misunderstanding Rolfe (in Flor. Trop. Afr. viii. 230) 
cites the species as a synonym of H. thomana Reichb. f. The 
two plants differ remarkably in habit; H. thomana has a tuft of 
rather large radical leaves, while the cauline leaves pass rapidly 
into bracts ; in H. barrina, on the other hand, there are no radical 
leaves, and the lower part of the stem bears reduced leaves which 
pass above into the more or less lanceolate foliage-leaves occupying - 
the upper part of the stem almost to the base of the inflorescence. 
The flowers also differ in the two species: in H. thomana the two 
divisions of the petal are strikingly unequal, in H. barrina nearly 
equal ; in H. thomana the lateral lobes of the lip are comparatively 
broad, falcate and retuse, in H. barrina slender, resembling the 
median lobe ; the length of stigmatic processes and anther-canals 
is also very different in the two species. 
ZINGIBERACE by Mr. H. N. Ridley. 
Aframomum seeptrum K. Schum. Oban ; nn. 85, 1594, 
1605. The form sent is apparently one-flowered. The picture 
sent with the specimens gives the flowers of a beautiful violet, 
with white bracts, the lip violet with a paler centre and some 
yellow streaks in the mouth. The lip is completely convolute 
round the stamen. The plant figured in the Botanical Magazine 
(t. 5761) is much paler in colour, only tinted violet. The fruit 
is smooth and scarlet. 
