140 URTICACE&. [[ CUDRANIA, 



dioecious, bracteolate. MALE FLOWERS : Sepals 3-5, oblong, obtuse, 

 adnate to 2-4 bracts, imbricate. Stamens 4, erect, more or less 

 adnate to the sepals. Pistillode subulate or obsolete. FEM, 

 FLOWERS : Sepals broader than in the male, embracing the ovary, 

 Ovary straight ; style terminal, simple or 2-armed ; arms stout or 

 slender ; ovule pendulous. Fruit of ovoid compressed crustaceous 

 achenes enclosed in the enlarged fleshy bracts and perianth and 

 forming globose and fleshy heads. Seed with a membranous testa, 

 albumen scanty, cotyledons twisted and folded, embracing the 

 slender upcurved radicle. Species 3 or 4, in Asia, E. Africa. 

 Australia and New Caledonia. 



C. javanensis, Trecul in Ann. Sc. Nat. Ser. 3, VIII, 123; Brand. 

 For.Fl. 425; Ind. Tress 614; F. B. I. V., 538; Wait E. IX; 

 Kanjildl For. Fl. (ed. 2), 378 ; Gamble Man. 651 ; i rain Beng. PL 

 970. Vern. Manda. 



A large straggling or subscandent spiny shrub or small tree ; bark 

 smooth, thin, yellowish-brown, with oblong horizontal lenticels ^ 

 branchlets pubescent ; spines usually curved. Leaves glabrous 

 subcoriaceous, 1-4 in. long, oblong or obovate to oblanceolate, obtuse, 

 acute or acuminate ; base obtuse ; lateral nerves slender, 8-10 pairs ;. 

 petioles J in. or less. Flower-heads solitary or in pairs, pubescent ; 

 the males J in. across ; the female-heads enlarging to j- in. in diam. 

 when in fruit. FEM. FLOWERS : Perianth -lobes 4, thickened and 

 velvety at the tips. Styles 2-fid. Fruit an irregularly shaped com- 

 pound berry somewhat resembling a small custard-apple (Anona), 

 pinkish-orange and velvety when ripe. 



Dehra Dun and Siwalik range and eastwards along the sub-Himalayan, 

 tracts of Rohilkhand and N. Oudh. Flowers Apr. -June, and the fruit 

 ripens in Aug. DISTRIB : Trop. Himalaya from the Sutlej eastwards 

 to Sikkim ; also Khasia Hills, E. Bengal, Orissa and Ceylon ; extend- 

 ing to Burma, the Malay Peninsula, China, East Africa and Australia. 

 The wood is used as fuel and the ripe fruit is eaten. The leaves of 

 this shrub are often attacked by a fungus which converts them into a 

 whitish brittle mass. This substance which is known by the name of 

 ' Mande-ki-roti ' is eaten by the villagers in Dehra Dun. This shrub 

 bears a great resemblance to Plecospermum spinosum both in habit 

 and foliage, but in the latter the stamens are inflexed in bud, as in 

 the tribe Morece, and the spines are and more slender and nearly 

 straight. I have seen no specimens of Plecospermum from within 

 the area of this flora and I am inclined to believe that Cudrania 

 javanensis has often been mistaken for it. 



