PLATE 201. 



ROYBNA VILLOSA, Linn. (Syst. ed. xii. 302.) 

 Natural Order, EBENAC&J:. 



A rambling shrub divaricately branching. Bark reddish brown, densely 

 rusty pubescent, or subvillose, older ones glabrous. Leaves alternate, petiolate, 

 exstipulate, obovate-elliptical, very obtuse at apex, often with a minute mucro, 

 obtuse or subcordate at base, quite entire, dark green and finely pubescent above, 

 lighter and more pubescent beneath, especially on veins and veinlets, midvein 

 reddis-h at base; edges more or less recurved; 1^ to 2 inches long, ^ to 2 inches 

 wide. Petioles densely villous, reddish, ^ to I inch long. Flowers solitary, or 2-3 

 together in axils of leaves, yellow, pedunculate, peduncles usually more or less 

 curved, densely pubescent or villous, 4 to 6 lines long, pedicels 2 to 4 lines long, 

 articulated below the flower. Bracts 2, leaf like, lanceolate, soon deciduous, 

 densely pubescent, 3-4 lines long, 1 line wide. Calyx gamosepalous, campanulate, 

 5-cleft nearly to base, lobes acuminate from a broad base, erect, pubescent, with 

 recurved margins, 1 J to 2 lines long, accrescent in fruit, tube very short. Corolla 

 gamopetalous, 5-lobed, lobes ovate, acute, spreading, twisted to the left, outer 

 exposed portion pubescent ; tube very short, inflated, pubescent, except at base, 

 the whole corolla 4 to 4^ lines long, tube 2j lines diameter. Stamens 10, at base 

 of corolla tube, two opposite each lobe, filaments much shorter than the anthers. 

 Anthers erect, acute, 2-celled, introrse, villous with long hairs. Style 1, deeply 

 5-lobed, pubescent. Stigmas truncate, ovary 8-10 celled, cells 1-ovuled. Fruit a 

 berry, densely pilose or hirsute with silvery white hairs, bluntly 5-angled and 

 enveloped by the enlarged calyx lobes which reach to 1 inch or more long, by 

 5-6 lines wide. 



Habitat : NATAL : Edges of woods rambling amongst the adjacent shrubs, from 

 close to the sea to 5,000 feet above it. Durban, Juue, Wood No. 6104. 



Drawn and described from specimens gathered near Durban, August, 1899. 



The genus Royena according to the Genera Plantarum includes 13 species 

 natives of tropical and extra-tropical Africa, and nine of these have been found in 

 Natal. The native name of the plant is " Cnandana," and they use the roots as 

 one of the ingredients in their emetics, it has no other use as far as known to us. 

 The flowers are yellow. 



Fig. 1, Twig with young fruit, reduced; 2, Section through flower; 3, Calyx, 

 ovary, and style; 4, Corolla opened; 5, Stamen; 6, Section through ovary. 

 Except Fig. 1 all enlarged. 



