PLATE 306. 



DAIS COTINIFOMA, Linn. (Sp. PI. Ed. II. 536). 

 Natural Order, THYMEMACEAE 



A shrub, or small tree, with dark brown tough bark. Leaves opposite, 

 petiolate, exstipulate, ovate to oblong-ovate, margins entire, acute or obtuse at 

 apex, tapering to base, dark green with conspicuous veins above, pale and with 

 prominent veins beneath ; 1 to 3 inches long, 1 to H incl1 wide > petiole 3 lines 

 long, channelled above. Flowers pink, in globose, terminal, long peduncled heads, 

 surrounded by an involucre composed of 4 bracts, the two outer ones largest, very 

 broadly depressed-ovate, two inner similar, but smaller ; all coriaceous. Receptacle 

 flat, pitted, margins of the pits bristly. Perianth tube cylindrical, gradually 

 widening a little below the throat, 1 inch long, \ line wide in centre, densely silky 

 villous; limb 5-lobed, lobes narrow oblong, spreading; 5 lines long, 1 to 1J line 

 wide. Stamens 10, in two series, 5 m throat of tube, 5 a little below, all exserted; 

 filaments filiform; anthers oblong, 2-celled, basifixed. Ovary superior, 1-celled, 

 1-ovuled, very villous, seated in a membranous tubular or cup-shaped, and irregu- 

 larly dentate disk. Style slender, shorter than stamens ; stigma globose capitate, 

 green, not reaching throat of perianth. Fruit dry, enclosed in base of the 

 persistent perianth, pericarp membranous. 



Habitat : NATAL : Midlands and upper districts. Liddesdale, 4,000 to 5,000 

 feet alt., Wood. 



Drawn and described from a plant which flowered in the Botanic Gardens, 

 November, 1902, Wood, No. 8699. 



This genus contains 7 species only, 3 of which are South African, 2 from 

 Madagascar, and 2 whose habitat appears to be unknown ; the above described 

 species is the only one known to exist in Nalal, and is also found near Barberton. 

 When in flower the plant is very handsome, and is found in cultivation in Europe, 

 having been introduced from the Cape in 1 776. The flowers are sweetly scented, 

 and are apparently dimorphic ; a figure of it appears in the " Botanical Magazine," 

 Vol. V. p. 147, where the styles are shown long exserted ; and in one specimen in 

 the Colonial Herbarium they are so, but in the specimen from which the drawing 

 was made the stamens are long exserted, and the style is included, remaining 

 within the perianth tube until the flower withers. This plant has flowered in the 

 Garden for several years, and producer seeds regularly. 



Fig. 1, flower; 2, upper portion of perianth opened showing insertion of 

 stamens ; 3, stamen ; 4, ovary and disk ; 5, style and stigma ; 6, longitudinal 

 section of fruit ; all enlarged. 



