Elatostema. | URTICACEA). 637 
diam. Males: Bracts broad, glabrous or puberulous. Flowers 
very numerous, pedicelled, hidden among the broad membranous 
bracteoles. Perianth 4- partite; segments abruptly acuminate, 
hyaline. Females with the bracts narrower and more pubescent. 
Bracteoles linear -spathulate, ciliate. Flowers almost sessile; 
perianth very minute, of 4 hyaline segments. Stigma penicillate. 
Achene minute, ovoid, smooth.—-Raoul, Choiw, 42; Hook. f. Fl. 
Nov. Zel. i. 227; Handb. N.Z. Fl. 258. 
Nort Istanp: Damp shaded ravines from the North Cape southwards to 
the middle of Wellington Province, but local to the south of the Waikato River. 
Sea-level to 2000 ft. Parataniwha. Flowers spring and summer. 
The heads or receptacles are usually described as unisexual, but it is not 
uncommon to find both sexes mixed in the same head. 
4. BOSHMERIA, Jacq. 
Shrubs or small trees. Leaves alternate or opposite, toothed, 
3-nerved ; stipules usually free, deciduous. Flowers moneecious or 
dicecious, in small globose glomerules ; glomerules axillary, either 
solitary or spiked or racemed or panicled. Male flowers: Perianth 
3-5-lobed or -partite; segments valvate. Stamens 3-5, inflexed in 
bud. Rudimentary ovary clavate or globose. Female flowers: 
Perianth tubular, compressed or ventricose, mouth often contracted, 
2-4-toothed. Ovary included, sessile or stipitate; stigma filiform, 
persistent ; ovule solitary, erect. Achene closely invested by the 
persistent perianth, crustaceous. Seed albuminous ; cotyledons 
ovate or elliptic. 
Species about 50, widely spread through the tropics of both hemispheres. 
1. B. dealbata, Cheesem. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. xxiv. (1892) 410. 
—A small tree 8-25ft. high; branches terete, pubescent with 
minute appressed hairs. Leaves alternate, 3-6in. long, ovate or 
ovate-lanceolate, acuminate, rounded at the base, rarely slightly 
cordate, obtusely serrate, prominently 3-nerved and with the 
secondary veins also strongly marked, green and glabrous and 
rugulose above, white and hoary beneath; petioles stout, #-2 in. 
long, grooved on the upper surface. Flowers minute, in small 
axillary sessile glomerules, which are either unisexual or androgy- 
nous. Male flowers: Perianth deeply 4-partite; segments oblong- 
ovate, acuminate, clothed with erect hairs. Stamens exserted. 
Females: Perianth tubular, dilated below, contracted at the 
2-toothed mouth. Stigma exserted, long, filiform, hirsute. Fruit- 
ing - perianth much compressed, broadly winged. Achene very 
minute, ovoid, quite smooth. 
KmrMapDec Istanps: Sunday Island, not uncommon at low elevations. 
Flowers most of the year. 
Nearly intermediate in characters between the Norfork Island B. australis 
-and the Lord Howe Island B. calophieba, but apparently distinct from both. 
