LILIACE^. 415 



to the outside (3) being the bract of the flower the other two (4) the 

 bracteoles. 



S 



4 .^T 



I 



Ground plan of spines and scales. S=stem. 



CHLOROPHYTUM. 



Asphodel- 



Herbs with short rhizome (not bulb) with fibrous 

 sometimes fleshy roots, crowded radical leaves, and 

 bunches of flowers in leafless racemes. Sepals and petals 

 three to seven-nerved, spreading out flat like a star, and 

 persistent after withering. More especially distin- 

 guished from other genera by each cell of the ovary 

 having two ovules and the capsule being three-angled 

 with flat sides. 



Species about 40 in tropical and sub-tropical regions. 



The true Asphodel of Europe differs in the flowers being one to each 

 bract of the raceme not a bunch of two or more as here. 



Chlorophytum malabaricum Baker, Lour on Baba- 

 boodons ! ; F.B.I, vi 335,' XV 8 ; White Asphodel. 



A small herb with short stem clothed with the bases 

 of the leaves, and thick white roots. Leaves all from the 

 ground, lanceolate, acute, usually folded along the middle 

 line, but without midrib, many-nerved, glabrous, and 

 bluish. Flowers usually in pairs, one opening much 

 before the other, in the axils of bracts, racemed in a 

 short spike, which rises without leaves from the centre of 

 the plant. Bract J^ inch, acuminate, three-nerved, thin, 

 longer than the pedicel. Pedicel shorter than the bract, 

 not jointed. Flowers star-shaped, ^ inch across; sepals 

 J^ inch, broadest above the middle, with midrib greenish 

 and raised into a slight keel at the end. Petals similar, 



