632 URTICACE. [Paratropis. 
tary or geminate spikes. Male flowers: Numerous, usually closely 
placed. Perianth small, 4-partite; segments broad, obtuse, con- 
cave, imbricate. Stamens 4; filaments inflexed in bud; anthers 
didymous, 2-celled. Rudimentary ovary turbinate. Female flowers: 
Few and lax, or numerous and dense. Perianth very small, 
4-partite ; segments unequal, closely imbricate. Ovary straight, 
sessile, exserted, 1-celled; style deeply 2-partite ; ovule solitary, 
pendulous. Fruit drupaceous, seated on the slightly enlarged 
persistent perianth, globose or ovoid, tipped by the short style; 
exocarp thin, fleshy; endocarp crustaceous. Seed subglobose ; 
albumen scanty ; cotyledons broad, foliaceous, conduplicate. 
A small genus of 6 species, 3 of which are found in New Zealand, 2 in the 
Pacific islands, and 1 in the Philippines. 
Leaves 4-1din. Female spikes +-3in., 3-8-flowered. 
Drupes 1-3 ripening on each spike, 4 in. diam. .. 1. P. heterophylla. 
Leaves 14-34in. Female spikes }-lin., 8—25-flowered. 
Drupes usually many ripening on each spike, fin. diam. 2. P. Banksit. 
Leaves 4-8in., entire. Female spikes 2-4in., many- 
flowered ; flowers in 2 rows on each side of the rhachis. 
Drupe fin. diam. .. ae : .. 3. P. Smithit. 
1. P. heterophylla, 6/. Mus. Bot. Lug Bat. ii. 81.—A tree 
15-40 ft. high, with a trunk 9-24 in. diam.; bark a9 or almost 
white, rough with raised lenticels ; branches numerous, crowded, 
glabrous or pubescent; those of young plants long and slender, 
flexuous, often interlaced, pubescent or setose at the tips, bark 
dark-brown. Leaves of young plants remote, +—$in. long, broadly 
obovate to oblong-obovate, acute or obtuse, cuneate at the base, 
rather membranous, glabrous or pubescent, See, often irregularly 
lobed or almost pinnatifid; of mature trees 4-14 in. long, oblong- 
ovate or oblong-obovate to elliptic, obtuse or acute, crenate or 
crenate-dentate, coriaceous, dark-green, prominently reticulate. 
Male spikes 4-1 in. long, shortly pedunculate, cylindric. Flowers 
closely packed, minute, sessile, intermixed with peltate scales. 
Perianth-segments rounded, margins ciliate. Stamens exserted. 
Female spikes + 4in. long, 3-8-flowered. Flowers lax, very 
minute, intermixed with peltate scales. Perianth-segments ap- 
pressed to the ovary, the 2 outer rather smaller. Drupe globose, 
small, red, tin. diam., usually 1 and seldom as many as 3 ripening 
on each spike.—Epicarpurus microphyllus, Raoul, Chor, 14, t. 9; 
Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl. 251. Taxotrophis microphylla, F’. Muell. 
Fragm. Phyt. Austr. vi. 193. Trophis opaca, Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. 
1. 224 (im part). 
Norte AND SourH IstaANDs: Not uncommon in lowland forests through- 
out. Turepo ; Milk-tree. October—February. 
Abounding in milky sap, which is said to be palatable. The wood is dense 
and heavy, but not durable. The spikes are often diseased, and converted into 
large much-branched panicles densely clothed with small imbricating bracts, 
the flowers being altogether aborted. 
