1916-17.] BOTANICAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH 189 



about '325 mm. long in longer stamens about 2 mm. in 

 shorter ; iilaments flattened at the base scarcely widened 

 and there most minutely puberulous eglandular. Disk 

 pubescent. Gynaeceum about 3'5 cm. long slightly ex- 

 ceeding the stamens but not the corolla ; ovary black- 

 purple slightly grooved narrow cylindric about 6 mm. 

 long by 2 mm. in diameter and most sparingly puberu- 

 lous (often below the middle only) very rarely bearing 

 here and there a single gland; style glabrous slightly 

 shorter than corolla and slightly clavately expanded under 

 the lobulate stigma. 



W.N.W. Yunnan. Tseku. Monbeig. No. 166. Herb. 

 Edin. 1907. 



A remarkable species, which we know only in specimens 

 collected by Pere Monbeig, and of which the precise 

 locality is not recorded. The specimens were received at 

 Edinburgh in 1907 when Pere Monbeig was residing at 

 Tseku, and Mr. Forrest, to whose kind intervention we 

 are indebted for them, tells me that Pere Monbeig's 

 collections at that time were made mainly to the N.W. 

 of Tseku, and this plant may therefore come from across 

 the Tibeto- Yunnan frontier. I hope Mr. Forrest may find 

 during his next exploration and send home material to 

 enable us to study more fully the structure and develop- 

 ment of the protective coating of shoot and leaf. This 

 covering is interesting. In the dried specimens the one- 

 year-old stem and the petioles are more or less white with 

 irregular flakes of wax which have cracked off" the surface 

 as shrivelling has proceeded. The older stems and petioles 

 gradually lose all trace of these flakes. The lamina on 

 the under side is glossy and covered with a uniform wax- 

 stratum. Apparently this peels off" in places and by so 

 doing bares the coloured reticulation of the veinlets that 

 in other places from which it has not separated is less 

 conspicuous. The upper surface is much less glossy, and 

 to what degree it is wax-coated I am unable to say on 

 the evidence I have. The whole feature requires for 

 complete understanding living material for dissection. In 

 Rh. lukiangense, which is the nearest ally to RJi. ceraceum 

 and very like it in many ways, there is the same coating of 

 wax, but in our specimens the coating seems to remain longer 



