Nephropetalum. STERCULIACE^. 341 



M. cokchorif6lia, L. Herbaceous, slightly hispidulous-pubescent or almost glabrous : 

 leaves ovate or subcordate, tliiu, more loosely veined, mostly loug-petioled : flowers capitate- 

 clustered at leafy summit of stem or short branchlets : petals smaller, pale purple with 

 yellow claws.— Spec. ii. 675 (Pluk. Aim. t. 44, f. 5; Dill. Elth. t. 176). M. hirsuta, Chapm. 

 1. c. ; Curtiss, distr. no. 400. — Streets of Mobile, Savannah, and in rice-field embankments, 

 Georgia, Feay, Curtiss. (Nat. from India.) 



3. "WALTHifiRIA, L. (A. F. Walther, professor in Leipsic.) — Tropical 

 and subtropical suflfruticose plants : the common species of world-wide distribu- 

 tion : small-flowered. — Gen. no. 552. 



"W. Americana, L. Canescent-tomentose becoming fulvous : leaves from ovate to nar- 

 rowly oblong, serrulate, plicate-veined : flowers in dense axillary glomerules, which are 

 sometimes all sessile, sometimes pedunculate and then often compound : bractlets and calyx- 

 lobes subulate, hirsute-villous. — Spec. ii. 673 ; DC. Trodr. i. 492 ; Chapm. Fl. 59. — Keys of 

 Florida. (Most tropics.) 



W. detonsa, Gray. Minutely canescent, low and diffuse : leaves round-oval to oblong, 

 somewhat serrulate, thin, with few and slender primary veins : flowers in small loose 

 glomerules, some few sessile in axils, mostly interruptedly spicate or concatenate on slender 

 peduncle or along slender summit of stems : calyx and ovary minutely canescent. — PI. 

 Wright, ii. 24; Torr. Bot. Mex. Bound. 40. — S. Arizona, Thurber, Wright, Lemvion. (Adj. 

 Mex.) 



4. AY!]ENIA, Loefl. (Due d'Ayen, botanical patron.) — Suflfruticose, small- 

 flowered, all from warm parts of America, euphorbiaceous in habit. Pedicels 

 axillary. —It. 199; L. Syst. Nat. ed. 10, 1247, & Gen. ed. 6, no. 1020; DC. 

 Prodr. i. 487 ; Schumann, 1. c. 101. 



A. pusilla, L. Low and diffuse from a ligneous base, puberulent : leaves most variable, 

 from orbicular or subcordate to narrowly lanceolate, serrate or sometimes entire, from a 

 quarter to inch and a half long, slender-petioled : flowers solitary or 2 or 3 in short-peduucled 

 fascicle : petals with nearly capillary claws and with a dorsal appendage to the hood : 

 stamineal column slender and at summit abruptly cup-shaped, its sterile lobes roundish, 

 much longer than the anthers : ovary shorter than its slender stipe, which in fruit is of 

 variable length. — Act. Stock. 1756, 23, t. 2 (Lcefl. It. 200), & Spec. ed. 2, ii. 1354; Cav. 

 Diss. V. 289, t. 147; Gray, PI. Wright, i. 24, ii. 24; Schumann, 1. c. 105, t. 24. — Key West, 

 Florida, and southern borders of Texas, Arizona, and California. (W. Ind., Mex. to Brazil.) 



A. microph^Ua, Gray, 11. cc. Woody and rigid, a foot or less high, canescent with 

 stellular pubescence : leaves orbicular or round-cordate, 2 or 3 lines long, dentate : flowers 

 mostly solitary in the axils, short-pedicelled : hood or limb of petals without dorsal appen- 

 dage : stamineal column short and wholly cup-shaped ; its sterile lobes thick, notched at 

 summit and surmounted by a reflexed acuminate appendage : ovary and capsule shortly 

 stipitate. — Rocky ravines, southwest borders of Texas to S. Arizona, Wright, Pringle. 

 (Adj. Mex.) 



5. NEPHROP]&TALUM, Robinson & Greenman. (Nec^po's, kidney, 



TTcVaXov, petal.) — Stellate-tomentulose shrub with simple ovate petiolate crenate- 



dentate leaves and very small flowers in pedunculate axillary few-flowered 



umbelliform cymes. — A single species of the habit of Ayenia and recently 



discovered on the Texan frontier. [By B. L. Robinson.] 



N.* Pringlei, Robinson & Greenman. Stems terete, at first cinereous-tomentulose, soon 

 glabrate : leaves ovate, obtusely acuminate, crenate-dentate, palmately 7-nerved, deeply 

 cordate with a narrow sinus, finely stellate-pubescent above, paler and tomentulose beneath, 

 3^ to 5 inches in length : cymes an inch in length, 2-3-flowered ; pedicels about equalling 

 the peduncles: flowers greenish, only a line in diameter. — Bot. Gaz. xxii. 168. — Valley of 

 the Rio Grande at Hidalgo, Texas, Pringle, no. 2272. 



