4^ TERNSTRCEMIACEiE. 



Eurya japonica Thiinbergliy var nitida, Korths; L.F.B.I. 

 i 284 VI I. Most often, as at Ootacamund, a shrub barely 

 10 feet high, but in the sholas of the Pulney downs also 

 as a tall tree, overtopping all others. Its most distin- 

 guishing characteristic is the arrangement of the quite 

 small flowers or berries on the lower, and leafless, 3 to 5 

 inches of short lateral branches which are leafy at the 

 ends. Twigs very slender, much indented by the scars 

 of the fallen leaves, and soon covered with gray or 

 whitish bark. Leaf-stalks ^ inch; blades I to 2 inches 

 elliptic or oblanceolate, shortly acuminate, closely 

 serrated except on the lower third, hard and shiny, 

 glabrous. Flowers in little groups of two or three^ 

 shortly stalked in the axils of the fallen leaves ; less 

 than % inch across when fully open. Sepals five, hard 

 and shiny. Petals five, united at the base. Stamens 

 about three times as many. Fruit a black berry, 1/5 inch 

 diameter with a minute three-fid style in the centre 

 of a depression at the top, and sitting in the remains of 

 the dried sepals. Seeds 1/20 inch, light brown, flat ; 

 embryo inside curved, t. 33. 



The F.B.I, gives three varieties, two of them as occurring here. But 

 I have seen only this one. It has smaller leaves than the type. 



Very common in sholas on both plateaus. 



Gen. Dist. Mountains of India, Ceylon, Burma, and the Malay archi- 

 pelago to China, Japan, Fiji, etc. Fyson 658, 1739, 2069, 2441. Bourne 

 9^, 323, 733-* 



The species has always been described as being a small shrub, like the 

 cultivated Tea; and that I am told is always its habit in China, etc. But 

 on the Pulneys and also, Mr. Gamble tells me, on the Sikkim hills, it .s 

 always much larger than Tea and often a tall tree j and I have on the 

 Tulneys collected from a tree at least 60 feet high (No. 2069). Our plant 

 may therefore be another species but I am unable to indicate any 

 other difference. 



GORDONIA. F.B.I. 24 XII. 



Anthers lightly attached to their filaments; fruit 



a- loculicidal capsule ; seeds with a wing at the top — 



Trees with evergreen entire or crenate leaves and often 



