EUCALYPTUS POPULIFOLIA. 



Hooker, ioones plantarum 879 (1852). 



Branchlets slender ; leaves scattered, on rather long stalks, orUcular-ovate or roundish, very 

 shining and intensely green on both sides, occasionally verging into an oval-lanceolar form ; veins 

 very spreading, but not crowded ; the circumferential vein distinctly removed from the edge ; the 

 oil-dots copious and mostly transparent ; umbels paniculate and mostly terminal or some singly 

 axillary ; flowers in each umbel from very few to 14, of very small size, on extremely short 

 stalklets ; tube of the calyx almost semiovate, slightly longer than the nearly hemispherical lid ; 

 stamens much inflexed while unexpanded, all fertUe ; anthers roundish-ovate, opening below the 

 summit by pores or abbreviated slits ; style very short ; stigma somewhat dilated ; fruits very 

 small, semiovate, 4-celled or sometimes 3- or 5-celled ; valves very short, situated close beneath 

 the rim ; seeds minute, without any appendage. 



In open forest-country from the southern as well as northern tributaries of the Darling- 

 Eiver, advancing eastward to the coast^country and northward to the Upper Burdekin-Eiver, 

 southward to the Murrumbidgee. 



A middle-sized or small tree, with wrinkled and somewhat fissurated bark, which persists as 

 well on the branches as on the stem. The colonial designations of this tree are Shining or Poplar- 

 Box-tree ; the natives of eastern subtropical Australia call it " Bembil " according to Mr. Edward 

 Bowman, who also remarks, that the wood proved durable for posts ; but of the particular quality 

 of the timber no records seem existent. Leaves occur sometimes 4 inches wide. 



With Sir William Hooker I regarded this as a species, distinct from B. polyanthema, when 

 defining it anew in 1858 (Journal of Proceedings of the Linnean Society iii. 93), after having 

 watched it for months in 1866 through its natural range. It replaces in the warmer latitudes of 

 the more interior regions of East-Australia the more southern E. polyanthema. In the journal 

 above quoted I had changed the name of this species to E. populnea, as Desfontaines had 

 mentioned (Catal. hort. Paris 1829, p. 408) already an Eucalyptus under precisely the same name, 

 employed by Hooker. The differences set forth in the description as distinguishing E. populifolia 

 from E. polyanthema, I believe to be specific ; they consist in leaves of lustrous green, often less 

 compound inflorescence, smaller and more crowded flowers on shorter or hardly any stalklets, 

 proportionately larger lid, stamens all fertile, anthers with more lateral openings, filaments of 

 darker color and smaller fruits. 



E. hemiphloia could hardly ever be confounded with B. populifolia, although it belongs also 

 to the section of Porantheree, its leaves are less shining and never broad, the flowers conspicuously 

 larger on longer and thicker stalklets, the lid gradually pointed, the fruits longer, the valves not 

 approaching to the orifice, while as indicated by the specific name the bark is not persistent on 

 the branches and often neither on the upper portion of the stem ; this species does not extend to 

 Spencer's Gulf, being known only from New South Wales and Southern Queensland and there 

 confined to the coast-districts or near to them. The South Australian tree, mentioned under this 

 name by Bentham, is E. Behriana, as proved by some differences iu the leaves, the suppression of 

 the stalklets and shortness of the lid as well as of the stamens. Again, the variety parviflora of 

 E. bicolor, mentioned in the flora Australiensis iii. 215, belongs also to E. populifolia. 



Explanation of Analytic Details. — 1, unexpanded flower, the lid lifted; 2, longitudinal section of 

 unexpanded flower ; 3, stamens in situ ; 4 and 5, back- and front-view of a stamen ; 6, style and stigma ; 7 and 8, 

 transverse and longitudinal section of fruit j 9 and 10, sterile and fertile seeds; 11, portion of a leaf; all more or 

 less enlarged. 



