16 



PLATE 264. 



HERMANNIA GERRARDI, Harvey (Fl. Cap. Vol. 2, Page 588). 

 Natural Order, STERCULIACE^:. 



A procumbent plant growing on dry rocks, or occasionally on moist banks. 

 Stems 2 to 3 feet long, lying close to the ground, simple or branched, hispid with 

 short, stalked, stellate, rigid hairs. Leaves stipulate, petiolate, oblong, obtuse, 

 subcordate at base, indistinctly crenate, laxly covered with stellate hairs both 

 stalked and sessile; 2-| to 5 inches long, including petiole, 1^ to 3 inches wide^ 

 stipules broad, amplexicaul, palmatifid. Inflorescence in lateral and terminal 

 branched racemes; flowers orange yellow. Calyx 5-fid, densely canescent with 

 stellate hairs, lobes acute ; pedicels slender, equalling the calyx ; bracts pinnatifid, 

 with linear segments. Petals 5, obovate, with the lower margin reflexed, nearly 

 twice as long as the calyx. Stamens 5, hypogynous, connate at base, anthers 

 2-celled, dorsifixed, rounded at base and each cell acuminate at apex ; filaments 

 broadly linear, slightly winged just below apex, stellate-pubescent. Ovary stel- 

 late-pubescent, turbinate, 5-celled, many seeded ; styles 5, separate, filiform ; 

 stigmas minute. Fruit a capsule. 



Habitat: NATAL: Dry rocks near Mooi River, W. T. Gerrard; near Curry's 

 Post, April, Wood No. 4448; Mount Gilboa range, J. Wylie, April (Wood No. 

 6069). 



Professor Harvey in describing this plant in the Flora Capensis says : ' This 

 has quite the habit and even the cloven stipules of Mahernia chrysantha, but the 

 filaments are those of a Hermam<ia though extremely narrow." 



These two genera are now united, Mahernia forming a section of the genus 

 Hermannia. This plant has no known useful properties, and the natives so far as 

 we can learn have no distinctive name for it. 



Fig. 1, calyx opened ; 2, lobe of corolla; 3, stamens, ovary, styles and stigmas; 

 4, ovary, styles and stigmas, more enlarged ; 5, a stamen more enlarged ; 6, cross 

 section of ovary ; all enlarged. 



