152 BALFOUR—NEW SPECIES OF RHODODENDRON. 
hairs. Inflorescence a racemose-umbel of many (30 or more) 
flowers, rhachis as much as 6 cm. long cobwebbed ; outer bracts 
unknown, inner fertile bracts oblong-spathulate truncate apicu- 
late as much as 6 cm. long 2 cm. broad inside and outside 
sericeous, margin slightly ciliate ; bracteoles linear barely 5 mm. 
long densely sericeous; pedicels short stout about 1.5 cm. 
or a little more long enwrapped in a thin ochre-coloured 
indumentum of cobwebbed hairs slightly swollen below the 
flower to which it is only slightly oblique. Calyx minute 
about 3 mm. long with 8 unequal deltoid teeth the larger 
sometimes twice as long as the cup tomentose like the 
pedicel. Corolla fleshy creamy-white flushed rose campanulate 
oblique about 5.5 cm. long on posterior side, the petals 
slightly pouched at base of tube, glabrous outside and inside 
8-lobed ; lobes a little over 1 cm. long 2 cm. broad. Stamens 
16 unequal shorter than corolla and gynaeceum, longest as much 
as 4.5 cm. long shortest as much as 3.5 cm. ; filaments slender 
slightly wider at base, glabrous; anthers oblong about 4 mm. 
long. Disk glabrous. Gynaeceum a little shorter than corolla ; 
ovary ovoid about 8 mm. long 16-locular grooved pink-tomen- 
tose being clad with fasciate hairs having short and thin 
stalks and long curling branches which form a loose woolly 
surface ; style glabrous clavate under the large discoid lobed 
ma 
W.N.W. Yunnan. Mekong-Salween divide. Lat. 28° N. 
Alt. 13,000 ft. In Rhododendron forest. Shrub of 20~30 ft. 
Flowers fleshy creamy-white flushed rose. G. Forrest. No. 
16,351. May 1018. 
This fine species must be placed in the Grande series. It 
differs in the indumentum from other members of the series. 
We have not sufficient material for ascertaining the history of 
development of the coating of the under surface of the leaves, 
but what we have suggests that in the young state the leaves are 
clad like others of the series with a white indumentum of cob- 
webbed and rosette-hairs. As the leaf oldens this withers on 
the upper surface in the usual fashion, but on the under surface 
it seems to disappear more or less over a large area of the surface 
save for a thin weft covering it like a fungus-mycelium. The 
green epidermis beneath it is visible. On other parts of the sur- 
face the indumentum persists and forms a white crust like that 
characteristic of the Grande series. There is no species in the 
series to which Rh. protistum has a specially near alliance unless 
it be Rh. grande or Rh. argenteum. It can be readily recognised 
by the broad lanceolate or oblanceolate somewhat thin leaves 
with the indumentum-character mentioned and it has a 16- 
chambered ovary. 
