Cussonia] lxviii. araliace^. 433 



lower woods from Isanga to Ngomba, occasionally forming forests, 

 abundant ; fr. Oct. 1856. No. 480. 



PtJNGO Andongo. — A tree, 15 to 30 feet high, the older ones with 

 a trunk 2 feet in diameter or more at the base ; trunk conical, very 

 erect, bare for two- thirds its height, then densely crowned with a 

 spherical head ; bark spongy ; wood white, tough, durable, used for 

 many purposes, chiefly for house building ; leaves 8-f oliolate ; leaflets 

 thinly coriaceous, rather fleshy and glossy ; flowers greenish, herma- 

 phrodite, arranged in straight racemes which are Ik feet long at the 

 extremities of the branches spongy-clavate and congested ; calyx'tube 

 adnate to the ovary, with a very short obsoletely 5-dentate limb not 

 exceeding the depresso-conical disk ; petals 5, inserted at the margin 

 of the disk, very patent at the time of flowering ; stamens 5, inserted 

 with the petals and alternating with them ; anthers incumbent ; ovary 

 inferior, crowned with the epigynous disk, 2-cened ; cells uni-ovulate ; 

 ovules anatropous ; styles 2, short, thick, straight, more or less 

 connate, truncate, stigmatose at the apex ; fruit not juicy. In forests 

 about the presidium along the banks of the river Cuanza, and of the 

 stream LuxUlo, in rather dry situations, abundant ; fl. beginning of 

 Dec. 1856, fr. March 1857. Native name " Mussdsa " or "Musassa" 

 or " Mussa§a." No. 479. 



HuiLLA. — A tree, 20 feet high and more, sufficiently singular ; 

 trunk elongated-conical, always very strictly vertical, fasciculately 

 branched at the apex ; head of foliage precisely globular. In the 

 drier forests, especially on a sandy soil, between Lopollo and the great 

 lake of Ivantala, at an elevation of 5,000 feet, non uncommon ; 

 without either fl. or fr. Feb. 1860. Frequently used at Lopollo for 

 making boundary fences, by driving in stakes to take root after the 

 fashion of willow-pitchers. Native name " Mupongo." No. 481. 



See Welw. Apont. p. 553, n. 110. 



According to Welwitsch the name of this genus was originally given 

 and communicated by him to Seemann before its publication by the 

 latter. It is the plant referred to by Welwitsch in Journ. Linn. 

 Soc. iii. p. 153 (1859), as a new genus of Araliacese. 



LXIX.— RUBIACE^. 



In Angola propei*, Rubiacefe are not so abundant in the littoral 

 region as in the mountainous and highland regions, vehere they 

 constitute a considerable proportion of the total vegetation in the 

 primaeval forests; the coast species are almost exclusively trees 

 or shrubs ; those of the mountainous region are for the most part 

 woody climbers or trees of noble habit, furnishing excellent 

 timber for building, as for example " Mangue do monte " 

 {Corynanthe paniculata), and " Mungo " {Mamboga stipulosa) ; 

 and in the highland region herbaceous species are mostly met 

 with, not less conspicuous, however, by reason of the elegance of 

 their habit and the brilliancy of their flowers. 



In this family, and particularly in the Cinchonese and neigh- 

 bouring tribes, the calyx and corolla are both pentamerous and 

 hexamerous in one and the same individual plant, and in the 

 same species some specimens are seen throughout with pentamerous 

 and others with hexamerous flowers, without any accompanying 



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