VILLEBRUNEA.] URTICACE&. 133 



10. VILLEBRUNEA, Gaud. ; Fl. Brit. Ind. V, 589. 



Trees or shrubs. Leaves alternate, petioled, entire or crenulate 

 penninerved or 3-nerved at the base ; stipules partially connate 

 intrapetiolar. Flowers dioecious, densely capitately fascicled, 

 fascicles solitary or laxly cymose ; bracts small, often linear ; 

 bracteoles cup-shaped, sometimes connate. MALE flowers : i eri- 

 anth 4- partite ; segments ovate, acute, valvate or slightly imbricate, 

 subglobose in bud. Stamens 4 ; Pistillode obovate clavate. 

 FEM. flowers. Perianth tubular, adnate to the ovary ; mouth 

 narrowed, minutely toothed. Ovary erect, covered by the ad- 

 herent perianth ; stigma sessile, small or discoid, ovule erect. 

 Fruit a crustaceous achene, adnate to the slight fleshy perianth. 

 Seed straight, often acuminate, testa membranous, albumen usually 

 scanty, cotyledons broadly ovate. Species about 8, in India and 

 the Malay Archipelago extending to Japan. 



V. frutescens, Blume Mus. Bot. Lugd. ii, 168 ; Brandis For. 

 FL 406 ; Ind. Trees 610 ; F. B. I. V, 590 ; Watt L.D., Kanjilal 

 For. Fl. (ed. 2), 382 ; Gamble Man. 659 ; Collett Fl. Siml. 468. 

 Urtica frutescens, Roxb. FL Ind. Hi, 589. 



A shrub or small tree with slender pubescent branches ; bark dark-grey, 

 rough. Leaves membranous, 4-8 in. long, elliptic, oblong lanceolate 

 or ovate, rarely suborbicular, acuminate or caudate, crenulate except 

 towards base ; base rounded or subcordate, 3-nerved to the middle 

 and penninerved above, sparsely plose on the upper surface, grey 

 or white beneath with woolly hairs, or glabrate ; petioles J-4 in. 

 long ; stipules J in., lanceolate, pubescent. Flowers in subsessile 

 clusters or short cymes in the axils of the previous year's leaves* 

 Fruit of many minute dry ovoid nuts, surrounded at the base by 

 the fleshy perianth and bracteoles. 



Dehra DUD, often found by the sides of water-courses, and eastwards 

 along the sub-Himalayan tracts of Rohilkhaud and N. Oudh. Dis- 

 TRIB. : Outer Himalayan ranges from the Sutlej to Sikkim, ascending 

 to 5,000 ft. ; also in Assam and on the Khasia Hills, and on the 

 Nilgiris in S. India, extending to China and Japan. The fibre is 

 used for ropes. 



11. DEBREGEASIA, Gaud. ; Fl. Brit. Ind. V, 590. 



Shrubs or trees. Leaves alternate, petioled, serrate- crqnate,. 

 3-nerved at the base ; stipules connate, intrapetiolar, 2-fid. Flowers 



