18 AMARANTACEZ. [ NoTHos#RuUA. 
spikes 1-3 in. long; bracts and bracteoles hyaline, acute, persistent. 
Perianth +, in. long, villous with silky hairs. Sepals acute or sub- 
acute, hyaline. Seeds minute, black and shining. 
Near Saharanpur (Edgeworth), Moradabad (T. Thomson), Oudh 
(Wallich), Bundelkhand and Merwara (Duthie). Distrie.: Punjab 
Plain, Sind, C. Prov., and south to Mysore and Ceylon ; also in 
Burma, extending to Mauritius and Trop. Africa. This plant is very 
similar in general appearance to rua lanata. 
7, ACHYRANTHES, Linn.; Fl. Brit. Ind. iv, 729. 
Herbs, often woody below. Leaves opposite, entire, petioled. 
Flowers 2-sexual, in slender simple or panicled spikes, soon deflexed; 
bracts and bracteoles spinescent. Perianth-segments 4-5, sepaline, 
rigid, somewhat connate below, lanceolate, aristate, shining, 
at length hardened and strongly ribbed. Stamens 2-5; filaments 
connate at the membranous base, with as many quadrate stami- 
nodes, each of which is toothed or has a toothed scale at its back ; 
anthers 2-celled. Ovary oblong, subcompressed ; style filiform, 
stigma capitellate; ovule solitary, pendulous from a long basal 
funicle. Fruit an oblong or ovoid utricle, areolate or rounded 
at the apex. Seed inverse, oblong, testa coriaceous ; embryo 
annular, surrounding the floury albumen, cotyledons linear or 
lanceolate, radicle erect.—Species about 15, in tropical and subtro- 
pical regions. 
A. aspera, Linn. Sp. Pl. 204; Roxb. Fl. Ind. i, 672 ; Royle Ill, 
321; F. B. I. w, 730; Watt EL. D. ; Collett Fl. Siml. 414 ; Prein 
Beng. Pl. 875 ; Cooke Fl. Bomb. tt, 495. Vern. Chirchita. 
A coarse weed, 1-3 ft. high. Stem erect, simple or slightly branched ; 
branches striate, pubescent. Leaves very variable, up to 5 in. long, 
elliptic obovate or suborbicular, usually rounded at the apex, tomen- 
tose or velvety on both surfaces, rarely glabrate ; petioles 4-3 in. 
long. Flowers many, greenish-white, sharply deflexed against the 
stout pubescent rhachis of the terminal spikes which elongate in fruit 
up to as much as 20 in. in length ; bracts shorter than the perianth, 
ovate, acuminate, aristate, persistent ; bracteoles about as long as 
the bracts, ending in a spine which hardens in fruit and remains 
attached to the fruiting perianth. Perianth }3-iin. long, glabrous 
and shining; sepals ovate-oblong, acuminate, white-margined. 
