Dyschoriste.] ACAXTHJCEJE. 193 



A perennial herb or suffrutiooflo. Stems many, glabrous or hoary, lab* 

 quadrangular, 1 'ranches usually proatrato and rooting at the nodes. 

 Leaven $-1^ in. long, broadly olliptic or obovato, obtuse, entire, tapering 

 Into the petiole, glabrous OX noarly so. Flower* subsossilo, in axillary 

 clusters. l»nut s nono; bractooles -f a in. long, linoar. Calyx J-^ in. long, 

 divided moro than i way down in flower, hairy ; segments lanceolate- 

 subulate, the margins membranous towards the base. CoroMapale violet- 

 pink, rather shorter than the calyx ; lobes spreading, oblong, rounded 

 or truncate. St a meus with the filaments connate in pairs at the base, 

 anther-cells shortly rnucronato. Capsule § in. long, glabrous. 



Kberi district of X. Oudh (Duthio), also in Bunrlelkband (Mrs. Bell). 

 Flowers March and April. Distbib. Bengal and in W. and S. India 

 to Ceylon extending to Tropical Africa. 



13. DJEDALACANTHUS, T. And.; Fl. Brit. Ind. iv, 417. 



Perennial herbs or shrubs. Leaves opposite, petioled, entire or 

 obscurely toothed, lineolate from embedded raphides. Flowers blue or 

 rose-coloured, in linear distant or close spikes or in heads ; bracts 

 usually large ; bracteoles linear-lanceolate, shorter than the calyx. 

 Calyx 5-lobed ; loins narrow, often scarious. Corolla slender ; tube 

 long, narrow, widened near the top or (in a few species) from the 

 middle ; lobes obovate, twisted to the left in bud, spreading in flower. 

 Stamens 2, glabrous, anthers narrowly oblong, 2-celled, muticous, 

 exserted or subincluded. Ovary glabrous, 4-ovuled ; style long, sparsely 

 hairy ; stigma simple, linear. Fruit a clavate capsule with a cylindric 

 solid base. Seeds normally 4, compressed, discoid, hygroscopically 

 hairy, retinacula acute. — Species 18, in India and Malaya. 



Spikes forming a close terminal panicle ; 

 bracts elliptic, subobtuse or shortly 

 acuminate, not ciliate . . . . 1. D. nervosus. 



Spikes usually solitary ; bracts ovate, 

 much acuminate, ciliate . . . 2. D. purpurascem. 



1. D. nervosus. T. Anders, in Joum. Linn. Soc. ix, 487 ; Royle III. 298 ; 

 F. B. I. ii» f 41? ; Watt E. D.; Kanjilal For. Fl. 261 ; Gamble Man. Ind' 

 Timb. 518 ; Collett Fl. Siml. 371 ; Prain Beng. PI. 807. 



A stout herb. 2-6 ft. high, with 4-angled scabrous stems. Leaves 6-8 in- 

 long, ovate, acuminate, entire or crenulate, lineolate, glabrous but scab- 

 rous on the nerves beneath, base attenuate, petiole |-1£ in. long. 

 Flotrerx in short uninterrupted bracteate spikes forming close terminal 

 panicles; peduncles \-V, ; in. long, often acutely 4-angled, glabrous or 

 obscurely pubescent ; bracts more or loss white with green nerves, 

 about ^ in. long, ovate or elliptic, subobtuse or sbortly acuminate, puberu- 

 lous, the margins not ciliate ; bracteoles shorter than the calyx, narrowly 

 lanceolate. Calyx i in. long, lobed half-way down, whitish, minutely 



