Plants Collected in Paraguay. 47 



exceedingly graceful. It climbs high and embowers tall shrubs in 

 the Pilcomayo thickets. January-June. 



Ranunculus apiifolius, Pers., Syn., ii, 105. 

 Buenos Aires (8). October. 



Ranunculus muricatus, L. Sp. PL, 780. 



Buenos Aires (7). October. 



ANONACE^. 



Rollinia emarginata^ Schleclit., Linnsea, ix, 315. 



Asuncion (99). November. = Balansa, No. 2296. Called in 

 Guarani, Araticu ; in Spanish Chirimoya. 



This is not the large edible Chirimoya so common in Peru and 

 the more northern South American countries, which, so far as I 

 know, does not occur in Paraguay. It is a slender shrub with a 

 handsome head of green, coriaceous leaves, 3-5 m. high, and some- 

 times a small tree of twice that height. The flowers are curiously 

 constructed, consisting of 3 small, ovate, appressed sepals, and 6 

 petals, the 3 outer of which are yellow, flat bodies that stand edge 

 upwards in a triangular position. These when drawn down at the 

 base exhibit 3 other petals entirely unlike the outer ones, being 

 small, rounded, and meeting in a whorl at the summit, with a pur- 

 ple interior. Under these is a ball or arch of cohering stamens, 

 which are completely concealed by the overlapping inner petals. 

 Under all is another ball or arch of styles and stigmas, and this is 

 completely enclosed by the over-arching mass of stamens. I could 

 see no possible manner in which the pollen could reach the stigmas, 

 and am satisfied that it must be done as in the next species of the 

 same order, which I examined more closely. 



Anona cornifolia, St. Hil., Fl. Bras. Merid., i, 33. Ex. descr. 



Asuncion and Pilcomayo River (149). November. = Gibert, 

 No. 1095. 



The outer petals here are not erect as in Rollinia, but flat and 

 imbricated over the inner ones. A very similar arrangement of the 

 stamens and pistils occurs however. The stamens are in an arched 

 disk, the central ones apparently infertile, and all cohering by trun- 

 cate callous connectives under which are the anthers. The stigmas 



