119. LORANTHACE.E. [2. Viscum. 



2. VISCUM, L. 



Parasitic shrubs with the leaves opposite or reduced to scales. 

 Flowers 1 -sexual, small or minute, solitary or fascicled. Hypanthium 

 solid or hollow in the male, adnate to the ovary in the female, tepals 

 3-4, green or yellow. Anthers sessile, adnate to the tepals, opening 

 by many pores. Ovary inferior, stigma large pulvinate. Fruit 

 succulent baccate. Embryo in fleshy albumen, solitary or 2 in each 

 seed. 



A. Branches leaf3' :— 



Leaves lanceolate or elliptic acute, neither very thick nor 

 venose. Bracts not cuspidate. Fruit oblong, pericarp not 

 dotted 1. monoicum. 



Leaves mostly broad and obtuse. Lower bracts usually cus- 

 pidate. Fruit subglobose, pericarp with lines of raised dots 2. orienfale. 



B. Branches flattened, leafless 3. articulafiim. 



1. V. monoieum, Roxb. Vern. Banda (often with the name of the 



host tree prefixed). 

 A tufted shrub with slender terete branches compressed at the 

 ends and narrowly elliptic or lanceolate acute leaves, often a little 

 falcate, with 3-5 slender principal nerves. Flowers few at the nodes 

 in groups of 3-1 between a pair of concave ovate bracts •04--05" 

 long with rounded tips, subsessile, with 1-2 similar pairs of bracts 

 below the floral. Tepals 4. Berry shortly stipitate oblong '25", 

 green polished with few longitudinal white veins. 



Manbhum (on Hellcteres), Carnp.l Ranchi, Wood (Pitorea); Santal Parganas ! 

 Fl. Nov.-Dec. Fr. Jan. 



The brancblets may become angled and grooved on drj'ing as in the next, but 

 the leaves are far less opaque and venous. 



2. V. orientale, Willd. Vern. as in last. 



A densely branched shrub with the branches frequently 2-3-choto- 

 mous or 3-4-nately whorled terete or flattened above, ridged and 

 channelled when dry. Leaves very coriaceous, ovate, ovate-lanceo- 

 late obovate or elliptic-oblong, usually rounded or obtuse, base equal 

 or oblique narrowed, subsessile, 3-5-nerved and with many nervules 

 (best seen when dry), 1-5-3" long. Flowers green or yellow, often 

 very numerous (up to 17) at the nodes, in sessile bracteate cymose 

 fascicles, very short branches of fascicle with pairs of bracts all or the 

 lower very often with a short cusp, ultimate pair of bracts short broad 

 conniving at their base, often rounded, •05--07" long bearing 2-3 

 flowers, male and female usually mixed. Berry broadly ovoid or 

 globose but apparently often ellipsoid when young, ripe pericarp with 

 lines of minute raised dots at least when dry. 



Frequent on Zizyphus, Crofon, Eri/cibe, and other trees and shrubs. Throughout 

 ■Chota NagiJur ! Angul ! Fl., Fr. more or less throughout the year. 



Key characters for the separation of this species and the last are very diflScult. 

 The branches are sometimes, at any rate, iiot grooved when fresh, the sliape of the 

 leaves is variable, the cuspidation of the bracts is not evident in my only specimen 

 with good male and female flowers, the minute warts on the pericarp are not 

 present when young, and it seems that when they are this constitutes the Viicum 

 verruculosum, W. <& A. The texture of the leaves appears to be the only constant 

 mark of distinction with their many nervules. 



The leaves have a matt .surface with the edges often slightly crimped. Male 

 ils. '07" long, tepals 3-4 triangular obtuse exceeding the hollow hypanthium, 



52 803 



