Brunnichia.'] cix. polygonace^ (baker and wright). 119 



5. BRUNNICHIA, Banks ; Benth. et Hook, f . Gen. PL iii. 103. 



Flowers hermaphrodite. Perianth-tube short ; lobes 5, equal, ovate. 

 Stamens usually 8, inserted on the thick disk ; filaments filiform ; 

 anthers subglobose. Ovary ampulliform, immersed in the thick disk ; 

 ovule 1, pendulous from a long funicle; styles 3, stigmatose at the 

 apex. Nut enclosed in the persistent perianth, trigonous; pericarp 

 coriaceous, intruded into the grooves of the seed. Seed with 6 deep 

 grooves ; endosperm slightly ruminate ; cotyledons oblong, rather longer 

 than the radicle. — Climbing shrubs, with forked tendrils at the end 

 of the branches. Leaves alternate, entire, petioled. Flowers small, 

 fascicled, arranged in long lax racemes ; pedicels elongated in fruit and 

 furnished with a coriaceous wing on one or both sides. 



A fourth species occurs in the Southern United States. 



Branches angular. 



Brandies glandular-pubescent . . , \. B. africana. 



Brandies glabrous 1. -B. africana^ var. glabra, 



Bmnches terete, glabrous 2. J5. ereeta. 



1. B. africana, Welw. in Trans. Linn. Soc. xxvii. Gl. A widely 

 scandent shrub ; branches patent, angular, multisulcate between the 

 angles, glandular-pubescent; tendrils (modified peduncles ?). supra-axillary, 

 forked, 2—4 in. long. Leaves oblong-ovate or ovate-elliptic, acuminate 

 or cuspidate, usually cuneate at the base, quite entire, membranous, 

 glabrous, 2^3 J in. long, lJ-2 in. wide, drying black; petiole 3-6 lin. 

 long, channelled above, pubescent. Kacemes 3-G in. long, increasing 

 to 1 ft. in fruit, bearing fascicles of about 3 flowers about 6 lin. apart ; 

 bracts ovate, acuminate, fleshy, membranous at the margins. Perianth- 

 tube short ; lobes oblong, acuminate, 2 lin. long, the three outer wider 

 than the two inner, rosy inside, suberect during flowering, becoming 

 connivent, hard and dusky purple in fruit. Pedicel in fruit nearly 

 3 in. long and 4 lin. wide, crimson. — Oliv. in Hook. Ic. PI. xiv. 21, 

 t. 1328 ; Dammer in Engl. Jahrb. xxvi. 357 ; Hiern in Cat. Afr. PI. 

 Welw. i. 905. 



lower Guinea. Angola; Golungo Alto; in forests by streams among the 

 mountains in Sobato de Bumba, and at the Capopa cataract near Sange, Welwitsch, 

 1754! 



Var. glabra, Dammer in Engl. Jahrb. xxvi. 357. A climber. Branches quite 

 glabrous. 



Upper Guinea. Liberia: within 20 miles of Kakatown, 7F%^e .' Gold Coast, 

 Burton I Cameroons : Bipinde, Zenker, 1125 ! 2031 1 2272 ! 2272a ! 2823 I 



2. B. erecta, Aschers. in Jahrb. Konigl. Bot. GarU Berlin^ i. 334. 

 An erect shrub, about 10 ft. high. Branches terete, many-Sulcate, 

 quite glabrous. Leaves oblong-elliptic, about 2 in. long, nearly 1 in. 

 wide, acuminate or nearly cuspidate, subcuneate at the l3ase ; petiole 

 slender, 4 lin. long. Panicle lax ; cymes 3-G-flowered, without tendrils. 



