44 ARISAEMA TRIPHYLLUM 
and to monstrous development of spathe or spadix. The most 
interesting reference, perhaps, is that to a report by Foerste (12) 
in which there is described a confluence of two leaf petioles and 
two leaflets and a partial confluence of two inflorescences. Phe- 
nomena closely related to this are not rare, and doubtless result 
from a duplication of initials in the early bud formation. The 
confluence of parts has been observed in all degrees, and in young 
and old, sterile and flowering plants. The petioles may be 
Fic. 52. Two leaves with almost entirely confluent petioles. X one sixth 
Fic. 53. A leaf with four leaflets, one of a group, all of which showed this 
character. X one sixth. 
attached together but a short distance from the corm or the con- 
nection may extend almost to the laminae (TEXT FIG. 52). The 
same is true of inflorescence, the attachment being in any degree 
from the doubled peduncle and separate spathes to the single 
spike with two sterile spadix sections as figured by Rennert (21, 
f. 2, M), or with a branched spadix as in PLATE 1, FIG. 19. 
These peculiar formations are in no way related to the forma- 
tion of two leaves by the old, vigorous plants, for, in that case, 
there is no confluence, one leaf initial being inside and of later 
formation than the other. In normal two-leaved plants the petiole 
of one leaf is enveloped by the other and the scape surrounded by 
both (TEXT FIG. 70). 
As in seedlings an occasional lobed leaf appears, so in older 
plants, there is sometimes found a leaf with the leaflets more or less 
united, usually so that the leaflets appear as lobes of a deeply 
divided leaf. Such forms are most often seen in two- and three- 
year-old plants. 
Rennert (21) also describes and figures a few clusters in which 
the spathe has failed to develop, appearing only as a scale below 
