I 



-♦> The Liberian Flora 



CAPRIFOLIACE^ 



Sambucus canadensis, L. ■ a shrub, very like the common Elder, with 

 large corymbs of white flowers and deep purple or black berries, 

 a native of the Atlantic coast region of North America, known 

 as " American Elder," introduced in Liberia ; Monrovia and 

 Sino Basin, W^/iyte ! 



RUBIACE^ 



Saroocephalus esculentus, Afz. : a tree or climbing shrub with ellip- 

 tic thinly coriaceous leaves, 2 — 8 in. by i — 4 in. (opposite as 

 in all the Rubiacea enumerated here), white fragrant flowers 

 in globose heads, 2 in. across, and deep red fruit-heads of 

 the size of a man's fist ; abundant near Monrovia, according 

 to Vogel. — The fruit is edible and krrown in Liberia as 

 " Country Fig " or " Country Peach." 



Uncaria africana, .G. Don. : an almost glabrous shrub climbing by 

 means of axillary spinescent hooks with dense globose heads 

 of yellowish outside silky tubular flowers, and long-pedicelled 

 spindle-shaped capsules and winged seeds, fruit-heads 3 in. across ; 

 Kakatown, Wliyte ! 



Virecta multiflora, Sm. : a spreadingly hairy annual with much-con- 

 tracted leaf-supported corymbs or clusters of slender white 

 funnel-shaped flowers, \ in. long, the branches of the corymb 

 ultimately lengthening with the small subsessile capsules on the 

 inner side ; Kakatown, Whyte\ 



V. procumbens. Sin. : similar to the preceding, but more or less pro- 

 cumbent, less conspicuously hairy, with very scanty and per- 

 manently contracted clusters of hairy flowers, ^ in. long ; 

 Kakatown, Whyte ! 



Otomeria guineensis, Benth.: a herb, 1—2 feet high, hirsute in the 

 upper part with ovate leaves and tubular white flowers, under 

 \ in. long, in ultimately long loose spikes with one sepal 

 foliaccous and larger than the rest ; Grand Basa, Vogel, 39 ! ; 

 Ansell\; Sino Basin, ]Vkyte\ 



Oldenlandia peltospennum, Hiern : a glabrous climbing shrub with 



ovate-lanceolate acuminate papery leaves, 2 — 4 in. by i — if in., 



panicles of distant very slender and loose spikes of pale blue 



flowers, \ — \ in. long, and globose capsules ; Kakatown, Wliyle ! 



VOL. 11 609 7 



