204 MISTLETOES AND LORANTHUSES. 



blood-red, whilst the verrucose lobes have almost the colour of the human skin. 

 The flowers are sessile upon roots which wind about upon the dark forest ground, 

 and a cadaverous smell, anything but pleasant, issues from them. All these 

 peculiarities explain the uncanny impression made by the organisms in question 

 upon their original discoverers and upon all subsequent observers. 



Whilst the Rafflesise, as well as the genera Brugmansia and Sapria, belong 

 to the tropical and sub- tropical regions of Asia, and to the world of islands adjacent 

 thereto on the south side, the genus Apodanthes is confined to tropical America. 

 Most of the species of Pilostyles also appertain to tropical America, especially to 

 Brazil, Chili, Venezuela, and New Granada. One species alone Pilostyles ^Eikio- 



pica has been observed in the mountains of Angola, and another, as has been 



mentioned before, in Persia. 



The only European representative of the remarkable group of Rafflesiaceas is 

 Gytinus Hypocistus, represented on the left side of fig. 42, but its distribution is 

 coincident with the entire range of the Mediterranean flora. The roots of cistus 

 shrubs, plants which are characteristic of the vegetation belonging to the basin of 

 the Mediterranean, constitute the nutrient substratum in the case of Gytinus. It is 

 especially where the layer of earth-mould is not deep, and consequently the roots of 

 the shrubs in question are exposed, that Gytinus is met with growing in abundance 

 amongst the under- wood of the cistus plants. The squamous leaves clothing the 

 stem of this parasite being scarlet, and the plants not solitary but in large numbers, 

 one sees here and there a flaming red colour glowing in the gaps in the cistus- 

 groves, and one is thus from far off made aware of the presence of the parasite. 

 The flowers themselves, which open between the red scale-like bracts, are yellow. 

 The combination of colour thus afforded is a rare phenomenon in the vegetable 

 world, and gives a very strange appearance to the plant. Besides the species of 

 Gytinus distributed over the area of the Mediterranean flora, there are two other 

 species in Mexico, and one also at the Cape, which, although not parasitic on Cistus 

 shrubs but on other woody plants, especially Eriocephalus, yet do not differ from 

 Gytinus Hypocistus in floral structure or in mode of connection with their host. 



MISTLETOES AND LORANTHUSES. 



The sixth and last series of parasitic phanerogams includes epiphytes of bushy 

 appearance with much bifurcated branches, green cortex, green leaves, and berries 

 containing large seeds, which germinate whilst resting immediately upon the 

 branches of such trees as are adapted to act as host-plants, and will surrender to the 

 invader a portion of their nutriment. To this series belong a dozen different species 

 of the genus Henslowia, belonging to the family of Santalacese, and indigenous 

 to the South of Asia chiefly the East Indian Archipelago and, in addition, 

 upwards of 300 species included in the family Loranthacese. Amongst the 

 latter, the plant that is best known and most widely distributed is the Euro- 

 pean Mistletoe (Viscum album) represented in fig. 46, and as it is also fitted, in 



