419 belonf to the genus , 



N. E. Bpovn 

 (To be continued.) 



LI33KffiRYANTIIEI.IUI',I . 

 Gerd. Chron. HI. 84: ir- . 1928^.^ 

 (Continued from page 419, Vol, IXCvIII, ) 



SPHADL-^TTHUS, N. E. 3r. 



i;-^ Succulent perennials, peulose on all the green parts. Root- 

 stock tuberous or fleshy. Steras rrostrete, herbsceous, or becoiaing 

 v/oody et the base. Leaves alternate or opposite, or those on the 

 flowering nart alternate and the remainder opposite, sessile, serai- 

 terete. Flowers solitary and terminal, or by the Grov:th of an az- 

 illary branch or branches, 2-6 to a stem and becoiaing one by one 

 lateral and opriosite the leaves, or in lax terminal leafy or brect- 

 eate C3'nes, pedicellate. Calyx r^roduced above its union v.dth the 

 ovary into a short tube, or subeoually 5-lobed nearly dov n to the 

 ovary; lobes with leaf-like tips. I'etals numerous, in 3 or more 

 series, united into a short tube at the base, passing into stamlnodes. 

 Stamens numerous, arisinfr from the tube of the corolla, erect, in 

 several series. Style none; stigmas 4-5, Ovary r^artly superior, 

 or inferior, 5-celled with axile Placentas. Capsule half superior, 

 the ui^rer i^art very convex or dome-like, v.'ith much raised sutures, 

 v/hen younp smooth and transparent so that the seeds within it may 

 be seen in the type (but perhaps not in all) species, v/ith usually 

 5, sometimes 4, valves and cells; valves widely spretding or recurved; 

 expanding-keels, contiguous, forming a central keel, united at the 

 base to th^ sept-^ and so forming the cell-partitions, ^■'■ith broad, 

 erect and "f^lap-like marginal wings unfolded upon the^T.; cells open 

 without cel.l-\':ings or tubercles. Seeds compressed, rounded or 

 horse-shoeshet)ed in outline, minutely tuberculate v? always). — 

 ^\ E. Br. in The Ga.rdeners* Chronicle, 1925, Vol. LXXVIII^, p, 433. 



Snecies 1- or more, natives of South -frier, '^e type is 3. 

 cenaliculatus, I"T. E. Bp. 



T}ie name is derived from the Greek, sphalma , e mistake, and 

 anthos, a flower, because these plants have mistakenly been placed 

 in the ^enus ^'lesembryanthemum. 



Sphalnanthus differs from '^ryophytum by its perennial habit and 

 tuberous rootstock, and from -^-rldaria by its tuberous rootstock, 

 nrostr^^'te stems, more pa'--ulose leaves, v;hich are mostly alternate 

 on the flowering part, and rr ther different flowers, otherwise the 

 general structure of these three genera is similar. I do not knov/ 

 if the unrine fruit of all the species is transparent so that the 

 seeds may be seen within it, as it is in 3. canalicula tus, but if 

 it is, this very remarkable character v/ill be an additional distinc- 

 tion. 



As the species of this genus are seldom cultivated, ^ am not 

 able to make a workable key of them, and may only indicate then by 

 the colour of their flov.-ers, v.^hich is variable in some species, and 

 as I have not a livinp" flower of the t'pe srecies, my sketch (^'ig. 

 8) of the fewer structure is made from one of S, fragilis. 

 Petals entirely white or v.-hitish, 



1, S. cpnaliculf=tus , '* , S, salraoneus , and see 10, 3. 

 commuta tus. 



Petals white at the upper p^rt, purple at the base. 



