IX, c. 4 Menill: Philippine Plants, X 315 



The first species of the genus to be found in the Philippines, and remark- 

 able among the few members of the genus in its very tardily dehiscent 

 follicles. In my material, which consists of fallen leaves and follicles, the 

 seeds are nearly mature, yet the follicles scarcely show a sign of opening, 



MELOCHIA Dillenius 



ME LOCH I A UM BELL AT A (Houtt.) comb. nov. 



Visenia umbellata Houtt, Handl, 8 (1777) 309. 



Wisenia indica Gmel, Syst. 2 (1791) 515. 



Melochia arborea Blanco Fl. Filip. (1837) 524. 



Melochia indica A. Gray ex F.-Vill. Novis. App. (1880) 29; K. Sch. in 

 Engl. Bot, Jahrb. 9 (1887) 209. 



This widely distributed and much-named plant has a peculiarly compli- 

 cated synonymy, and for the last twenty years has been considered by many 

 botanists, after K. Schumann, under a specific name that was neither pub- 

 lished by the original author Houttuyn under Visenia, as V. indica, and 

 was never transferred to Melochia, as M. indica, by A. Gray until the 

 transfer was made by F.-Villar and K. Schumann and wrongly credited to 

 Gray. Houttuyn in 1777 published the species as Visenia umbellata, and 

 this is apparently the oldest valid specific name. Gmelin seems to have 

 made the first use of the specific name indica, for he publishes it as Wisenia 

 indica with a reference to Christmann and Panzer's German edition of 

 Houttuyn's work Vol. 6 (1780), where, however, the species appears as 

 Visenia umbellata. Gmelin, then, simply proposed a new specific name, 

 indica, to replace that proposed by Houttuyn. Hasskarl " seems to have 

 been the first author to credit the combination Visenia indica to Houttuyn, 

 which he later repeated in his Platae Javanicae Rariores, from whence it 

 passed into Miquel's Flora Indiae Batavae and other works. K. Schumann 

 manifestly took up the specific name from Miquel. 



Asa Gray never published the combination "Melochia indica (Houtt.) 

 A. Gray" in the Botany of the Wilkes Expedition as credited to him by 

 K. Schumann* but simply indicates that: "Visenia cannot be generically 

 distinguished from Melochia" K. Schumann was, hence, in error both in 

 taking up the specific name indica, and in crediting its transfer to Melochia 

 to A. Gray. Visenia umbellata Houtt. seems to supply the correct specific 

 name, under Melochia, for this very common and widely distributed species, 

 and is accordingly here taken up. 



Fernandez- Villar is the first author actually to make the combination 

 Melochia indica, but his publication of the combination has been entirely 

 overlooked by later authors, and does not appear in Index Kewensis. In 

 the Novissima Appendix to the third edition of Blanco's Flora de Filipinas 

 (1880) 29 the name Melochia indica appears, but is erroneously credited 

 to A. Gray on the authority of Bentham & Hooker f. Gen. PI. 1 (1862) 

 224. Bentham & Hooker f., however, do not make the transfer, but simply 

 state: "Cetera omnia Riedleiae conveninunt et monente Grayo Viseniam 

 pro sectione Melochiae potius quam genere proprio habemus." 



Other sjmonyms of this species are: Visenia tomentosa Miq., Riedleia 

 tiliaefolia DC., R. velutina DC, Glossospermum velutinum Wall., G. cor- 



'Tijdschr. Nat. Gesch. 12 (1845) 122. 

 "Engl. Bot. Jahrb. 9 (1887) 209. 



