266 LILIACEM. [ CHLOROPHYTUM. 



8. CHLOROPHYTUM, Ker. ; FL Brit. Ind. vi, 333. 



Herbs with a short hard rootstock emitting many fascicled roots, 

 often thick and fleshy or tuber-like. Leaves radical, clustered, often 

 broad, rarely linear or lorate. Flowers laxly racemed on a simple 

 or bra'nching leafless scape ; pedicels usually fascicled in the axils 

 of small scarious or large membranous bracts. Perianth petaloid, 

 marcescent or persistent, rarely deciduous ; lobes free, rotate. 

 Stamens 6, hypogynous, free or the 3 inner adnate to the perianth- 

 lobes, included ; filaments filiform, often widened above the middle, 

 anthers oblong or linear, introrse, the filament inserted in a pit on . 

 the back of the connective. Ovary 3-quetrous, style filiform, 

 stigma small, ovules 4 or more in each cell. Fruit a coriaceous 

 truncate 3-quetrous loculicidal capsule. Seeds broad, usually 

 compressed, rugose, testa black, albumen rather hard ; embryo 

 often curved and rather large. Species about 40, in tropical and 

 sub-tropical regions. 



C. tutjerosum, Baker in Journ. Linn. Soc. XV, (1876), 332 ; 

 F. B. I., vi, 334 ; Prain Beng. PL 1077 ; Cooke FL Bomb, ii, 772. 

 Anthericum tuberosum, Eoxb. FL Ind. ii, 149. 

 Boot-fibres cylindric, with ellipsoid tubers hanging from them. Leaves 

 sessile, membranous, usually ensiform, falcate, acuminate, recurved, 

 8 in. long or more ; margins crisped or undulate. Scape terete, 

 naked, usually longer than the leaves. Flowers white, in simple or 

 shortly branched racemes 2-4 in, long, bracts lanceolate, acuminate, 

 the lower ones J-f in. long ; pedicels ascending, J-J in. long, jointed 

 below the middle. Per. -segments less than J in. long, oblong- 

 lanceolate subacute, 7-9-nerved. Stamens shorter than the perianth ; 

 anthers narrowly linear, afterwards twisted. Capsule f in. long, 

 obovoid, emarginate, shining, transversely veined ; cells 4-6-seeded. 

 Seeds black. 



Gorakhpur (Vicary) : N. Oudh, in the districts of Gonda and Bahraich 

 (Duthie). DISTRIB. : Behar and W. Bengal ; Central India and 

 from the Konkan and N. Circars to Travancore, also in Burma and 

 extending to Abyssinia. 



All-ium Linn. ; FL Brit. Ind. vi., 337. This genus contain 

 over 250 species and is distributed in northern Temperate regions. 

 Tho 27 species recorded in the F. B. I. as growing wild in India are 

 nearly all confined to the Himalayan ranges. The cultivated 

 kinds about 5, are briefly mentioned below. 



