376 URTICACE^. 



reddish, campanulate or hemispheric, 1/12 inch; in bud 

 flat-topped. Male sepals five, inflexed. Female flowers 

 minute, ripening before the male flowers and therefore 

 mostly to be found in the upper axils. Sepals five, 

 scarious, tips not inflexed: style J^ inch, hairy like a 

 cat's tail. Fruit J^ inch, nearly circular flat or flattened 

 on one side with low wing in the middle : but inside dark 

 green, pointed. Very variable in respect of hairiness. 

 t. 239. Wight Ic. t. 1978. 



Pulneys : in sholas on the downs. Flower September. 

 Nilgiris. Fyson mi, 1351, 2063, 2742, 3097. Bourne 226, 

 292, 505, 1828, 2921. 



DROGUETIA. f.b.i. 136 xlv. 



Slender herbs with opposite or alternate three-nerved 

 toothed leaves, without stinging hairs. Flowers of the 

 type of tribe 7 JJRTICEJE (p. 370) but much reduced and 

 collected into scabrid calyx-like involucres : the male 

 flowers with a small three-to five-lobed perianth and a 

 single stamen inflexed in bud, and the female flower with 

 no perianth but only an ovary and long straight stigma : 

 usually arranged with a female flower in the middle of 

 the involucre and four or more male flowers round it. 



Species 4 in India and Africa. 



Droguctia diffusa Wedd. ; F.B.I. v 593, XLV I. Stem 

 slender diffuse hairy, with long internodes. Leaves 

 stalked, % to ij^ by J^ to I inch, ovate coarsely 

 crenate-serrate, with a few scattered hairs on the upper 

 side and on the nerves of the under. Involucres, one to 

 four at a leaf-axil, salver-shaped, with short stalk and 

 lobed bowl, silky : bract very silky. Flowers very small, 

 one female and one to three males ; the perianths of the 

 latter closely attached together and coalescing into one 

 rather fleshy mass. t. 240. Wight Ic. t. 1982. 



