C8 DIDYNAMIA ANGIOSPERMIA. SiphotiaUthuS. 



0\ ieda mitis. sp. pi. cd. Willd. iii. 382. 



Found wild from Orissa northward ; where it grows to be 

 a tall, straiglit shrub. Flowering lime the hot season, and 

 again in October; the seed ripens iit the cool season. 



*S'/rm erecl, straight, ssiniple, or \\\{\\ very few, straight 

 branches, more or less piped, according to the age of the 

 plant ; hark smooth, greenish ; yotniy shoots smooth, of a 

 shining" green, with a double groove or furrow to each leaf of 

 the verticel,aMd piped in the old woody parts; height various. 

 In souje parJs of Bengal they are so long as to serve for rafters 

 to cottages, an<l various other u-e«. Leaves verlicelled, gene- 

 rally from three to five-fold, short-petioled, horizontal, lance- 

 olate, entire, waved, above smooth, of a deep, shining green, 

 below paler, from six to nine inches long. Floral leaves 

 alternate and smooth. Stipules none, but in their place some 

 short hairs. Fascicles from the axills of the exterior, alter- 

 nate leaves, peduncled, in general solitary, erect, generally 

 three-cleft; the whole forming a large elegant panicle. Pe- 

 duncles and pedicels rouniiish, smooth, coloured. Bractes 

 lanceolate, size various. Floivers, wlit^ii \\\vy liristopen, while, 

 gradually changing to cream colour. Calif x beneath, cam- 

 panulate. Corol ; tube exceedingly long, slender, bow- 

 ing. Harder five-parted ; divi6ions oblong, nearly equal, 

 reflected ; the lower two more distant. Filaments four, in- 

 serted within the mouth of the tube, projecting in a double 

 curve lor some time alter the flower first expands, afterwards 

 they become revolute. Anthers incuiubent, Sec. according 

 to the position of the filaments, base two-parted. Germ and 

 contents as in S. hastata, four lobed. Style longer than the 

 stamens, at first projecting, or recurved, after imj)regnation 

 ascending, when the stamens become revolute. Stiyma 

 acute, two-parted. Berries from one to four, conjoined, sit- 

 ting- on the enlarged, coloured calyx, singly the size of a pea, 

 when ripe, of a dark bluish colour. t'ceds one in each lobe 

 of the berry; it seldom happens that all the four berries come 

 f perfection. Embryo as in 8. hastata. 



