124. UBTICACE^. [4. Pilea. 



quite innocuous at some times of the year. This is due to the hairs beinsr 

 deciduous, and that they are especially abundant on the inflorescence. While 

 cutting coupe-lines in November in the Sikkim Tarai, where it is sometimes 

 g'reerarious, my coolies have been attacked with sneezing, violent catarrh and 

 ultimately vertigo from, apparently, inhaling the numerous minute hairs. 



3. GIRARDINIA, Gaud. 

 Herbs or undershrubs with stout stinging hairs. Leaves alternate 

 palmately 3-nerved, often lobed, stipules intrapetiolar connate, foli- 

 aceous. Flowers dioecious or monoecious, clustered, clusters in simple 

 or panicled spikes or heads armed with stinging hairs. Male : sepals 

 4-5-valvate, stamens inflexed in bud, pistillode globose or cupular. 

 Fern. : perianth tubular, ventricose, 2-3-toothed, at length split on 

 one side. Ovary straight, stigma subulate, papillose. Achene broad, 

 compressed, seated on the perianth, pericarp rather thick. Seed sub- 

 exalbuminous, cotyledons broad. 



1. G. zeylanica, Decaisne. Syn. G. heterophylla, var. zeylanica, 

 F.B.I. ; Nettle. 



A coarse herb 4-6 ft. high with numerous long slender stinging 

 bristles. Leaves large lobed and coarsely dentate or serrate, 4-8" 

 long and broad, membranous, with numerous short fine bristles or 

 hairs. Stipules '3—5" long, 2-fid, membranous or somewhat green. 

 Male flowers 4-merous mostly in short axillary spikes, hairy, filaments 

 long persistent. Pistillode globose. Female fls. in dense capitate 

 panicles with fleshy cymose branches and very bristly with stinging 

 hairs. Perianth sometimes with a short free tepal on the split side. 

 Fruit coriaceous, '15" diam., flattened, obliquely ovate, persistent 

 style deflexed. 



Not at all common. Ranchi district, 2000 ft. and above, Pitorea, Wood I 

 Ichadar ! Fl., Fr. Oct.-Nov. Dies back in the c.s. 



4. PILEA, Lindl. 

 Herbs, rarely undershrubs. Leaves opposite, often unequal in 

 the pairs, palmately 3-nerved (subnerved in P. microphylla), stipules 

 intrapetiolar. Flowers minute, monoecious or dioecious, in axillary 

 peduncled dichotomously branched cymes with bracts small or 0. 

 Male : sepals 2-4, free or connate in a cup, often gibbous or horned 

 at the back, pistillode conic or oblong. Fem. : tepals 3, rarely 4, 

 very small and unequal, dorsal longest, sometimes gibbous or hooded, 

 staminodes minute, of scales or 0. Ovary straight, stigma sessile 

 penicillate. Achene ovoid or oblong, compressed, embraced by the 

 base of the tepals or not. Seed erect, albumen very scanty, cotyle- 

 dons broad. 



Erect herb with narrowly elliptic leaves 3-6" long . , .1. script a. 

 Prostrate herb with very small leaves •l-*2" . . . .2. microphylla. 

 Similar with leaves up to -b-Q" var. portulacoides. 



1. P. scripta, Wedd. 



An erect branched glabrous herb with rather succulent stems, 1-3 ft. 

 high. Leaves sometimes slightly unequal in the pairs or with unequal 

 petioles, narrowly elliptic finely acuminate, 3-6" long, closely acutely 

 i)ut shallowly serrate, lineolate both sides with minute cystoliths, 



813 



