268 R. Marloth, Ph.D., M.A.— The [Oct. 26^. 



Marleth «t E^.f^ler ; A. Luderitzii^ Engler ; A. Marlothii,'EngleT ;. 



A. uncinata, Engler ; A. Engler and one new species from 



Griqualand West. These twenty-seven species are easily arranged 

 in two natural groups according to their inflorescence, the one section 

 bearing the flowers in glameroles, the other one in racemes. 



Less scientific, although perhaps sufficient from a practical point 

 of view, is the principle of classification which Baines*" mentions as 

 established by Dr. Kirk. He divides them into three groups, viz., 

 species which tear the clothes, those which tear the flesh and those 

 which tear clothes and flesh. 



For our purpose, however, I thought it best to adopt another plan 

 and to deal firstly with the shrubby species and then with the trees, 

 putting aside the two climbers {A. pennata and Kraussiand). 



There are altogether fifteen species of the shrubby form, out of 

 which number I may mention the seven most remarkable types. 



A. stolmiifera, Burch., the lowest of all of them, is common in 

 Griqualand West. The branched underground stem sends up- 

 numerous straight twigs, 3 to 4 feet high, which, growing close 

 together, form pretty little islands of fresh verdure on the rufous soil. 

 A much greater influence on the features of the country is exerted 

 by A. detineus Burch., the Haakedorn of the colonists. It is a bush 

 6 to 10 feet high, sometimes forming thickets to the exclusion of all 

 other shrubs. Such places are very trying to the traveller and parti- 

 cularly so to his oxen and the canvas-cover of his wagon. I cannot 

 better illustrate this obtrusive plant than by quoting Burchell,t who 

 named it detineus out of mere revenge. He made his first acquaint- 

 ance with it shortly after he had passed the Orange River and he 

 describes this interview as follows : 



"I kept with two of the Hottentot waggons, but they led me 

 through such close thickets of thorny bushes, and which seemed ready , 

 every minute to tear away the canvas from the tilts, and our clothes 

 from off our backs, that I had given up all hopes of finding our way 

 out of them till the morning. . . . The largest shrubs were about 

 5 feet high. . . ., and it is the same thorny bush which gave us 

 so much annoyance the night before where it was above 7 feet high. 

 I was preparing to cut some specimens of it ; which the Hottentots 

 observing, warned me to be very careful in doing so, otherwise I 

 should certainly be caught fast in its branches. In consequence of 



* Th, Bairns. Explorations in South Africa, p. 147. 



f W. J. Burchell, Travels in the Interior of Southern Africa Vol. I., pp. 308 and 

 ;J0.9. London, 1822. 



