74 t»LA^TS 01* BERMITDAo 



laciiiiate segirieuts, the branches terminating in umbels of hand- 

 Home scarlet flowers, borne on coral-like stalks. Jatropha pandtcri- 

 folia has somewhat similar flowers and fiddle-shaped leaves ; it may 

 be seen at Pembroke Hall and other places. Jatropha Manihot is 

 the Cassava, the starch of which (Tapioca) is prepared by washing 

 and baking into a favourite article of food. The Cassava is grown 

 from slips, which are planted about January, and take nearly a year 

 to produce the full -sized tubers ; it is a smooth shrubby plant, 

 three to four feet high, the leaves being cut nearly to the base into 

 five or seven lanceolate acute, entire segments. 



CrotoH variegatum, G. discolor, and some other species, have been 

 introduced on account of their ornamental foliage. A few trees of 

 the Otaheite Walnut (Aleicrites triloba) are found here and there 

 {e.g.. Public Buildings); the leaves are three-lobed, the middle 

 segment largest, and together with the brauchlets and long petioles 

 are covered with a mealy down. The Slipper plant (Pedilanthus 

 tithymaloidesj is common in gardens ; the polished rod-like stems 

 and glossy leathery leaves are of an intense dark green, the scarlet 

 involucre of the flower bears a fanciful resemblance (when inverted) 

 to a lady's slipper. 



•fC Euphorbia splendens is also a general favoiuite ; the angular thorny 

 stem is prostrate, bearing a few small ovate leaves, the flowering 

 branch is two or three times forked, each division bearing a pair of 

 broad, scarlet bracts, which embrace the minute flowers with their 

 concave base. 



The Centipede plant, a leafless species of Xylophylla, is frequently 

 grown as a curiosity ; the erect stem is cylindrical, but the branch- 

 lets are broad, flat, and jointed, bearing dense alternate clusters of 

 small greenish -white flowers at the joints. Other species repre- 

 sented here are the Tallow tree f Stilling ia acbiferaj, the Sand-box 

 tree (Rura crepitans), Otaheite gooseberry (Gicca distieha), and 

 Euphorbia candelabra. 



^ I. EUPHORBIA. 



Kerbs with a milky juice and clusters of imperfect flowers contained in 

 a cup-shaped, four or five-lobcd involucre, glands usually alternating wiilt 

 the lobes ; male florets several, each consisting of one stamen only with a 

 little bract at base ; female floret solitary, central, consisting of a stallced, 

 protruding, three-celled ovary ; styles three, bifid; capsule three-seeded, 

 hanging out of the involucre. 



1. E. bu.cifoUa (Seaside spurge). A small, glaucous, perennial 

 plant, half shrubby at the base ; stems spreading and branching, 

 pui-plish, leafy, about a foot long ; stipules between the petioles, 

 triangular, few-toothed, purplish ; leaves half-inch long, opposite, 

 .shortly petiolcd, quite entire, ovate, pointed, oblique at the sub- 

 cordate base, milky green ; heads crowded at the end of branches, 

 involucre I'our-lobed. Distribution, Bahamas and Florida ; habitat, 

 seasliores, common, probably indigenous. Heads greenish -white ; 

 September to December. 



