Flora of the Malayan Peninsula. 19 
Plants usually with recurved prickles on stem and leaves, 
sometimes only one or two at the base of the sti- 
pules :— 
Nutlet trigonous ne eye .. 7. P. strigosum. 
Nutlet biconvex st Eh .. 8. P. pedunculare. 
It is curious that P. plebejum, although so widely spread throughout the 
tropics, appears to be as conspicuously absent from the Malayan Peninsula as 
from Ceylon. 
1. PoLyGonum TOMENTOSUM, Willd. in Sp. Pl. II. 447 (1799). 
Root-stock prostrate, annual. Stems 6—12 dm., stout, erect, un- 
branched, with well developed internodes, grooved and glabrous or 
slightly pubescent where,exposed. Leaves light green when fresh, very 
shortly petioled lanceolate, finely acuminate both at apex and base, 
strigosely or silkily hairy on both surfaces, 14—28 cm. long and 
2:°5—4:5cm. broad ; petiole6 mm. long; veins numerous, 20—30, often 
obscure. Stipular-tube well developed, membranous, almost or en- 
tirely concealing the internode and impressed by its grooves and 
furrows, sparsely or thickly strigosely hairy; mouth truncate, beset 
with stiff cilia. Inflorescence of branched spiciform racemes; pedun- 
cles stout, strigose ; racemes 5—10 cm., erect ; bracts crowded, tubular, 
strigose and ciliate. Flowers 4—6 in the axil of each bract; pedicels 
about 3 mm. long, articulated below the perianth, and surrounded ait 
the base by a delicate hyaline membranous bracteole. Perianth 
eglandular, about 4 mm. in diameter, white; segments 5, subequal, 
strongly veined. Stamens 5—8, alternating with minute glands at the 
base of the filaments which are nearly as long as the perianth seg- 
ments; anthers large. Ovary lenticular. Style short, bifid above; 
stigmas capitellate. Nut large, biconvexor orbicular, black polished, 
closely invested by the perianth. Roxb. Hort. Beng. 29 and Fl. 
Ind. II. 287; Miq. Fl. Ind. Bat. I. i. 1006; Hook. f. Fl. Br. Ind. V. 
30; Wall. Cat. 1709 C and D. Polygonum ocreatum, Houtt. Pfl. Syst. 
VI. 442. t. 49, f.1. Polygonum pulchrum, Blume Bijdr. 530. 
Perak : Kunstler 393!; Wray 2034!; at Ipoh, Curtis 3178!; Des- 
champs!.—Distris. Africa, India, Burma, Andamans, Siam, Malayan 
Archipelago, Philippines. ; 
2. PoLyGonum minus, Huds. ; Meissn. in DC. Prodr. XIV. 1. 111 
(1856). Stem creeping or ascending or erect, 15—30 cm. faintly 
erooved, glabrous. Leaves sessile, linear or lanceolate, acute, glab- 
rous or minutely strigose, especially on the midrib and nerves beneath, 
2—5-7 em. long and about 6 mm. broad ; nerves few or none apparen 
