PLATE 544. 



PtJPALiA ATROPUiiPDEBA, Moq. (Fl, Cap. Vol. V, Sect. I, Part II, p. 424.) 



Natural Order Amaeantaoe^. 



An annual or biennial herb with long straggling branches, and small green 

 flowers. Stems 2 to 5 feet high; internodes terete, green, glabrous or slightly- 

 pubescent, nodes swollen and compressed, usually reddish -brown; branches 

 similar to the stems, but nodes not, or scarcely, swollen or coloured. Leaves 

 opposite, petiolate, ovate-acuminate to broadly lanceolate, quite entire, cuneate or 

 more or less xmequal at base, glabrous and shining above, pale and dull beneath, 

 veins more or less prominent on both surfaces ; 1 to -3 inches long, -^ to 1 -^ inch wide ; 

 petiole 2 to 7 lines long. Flowers in lax terminal spikes, composed of clusters of 

 3 perfect and 4 sterile flowers, the sterile ones reduced to hooked reddish piirple 

 awns; bracts, lowest lanceolate, remainder ovate-lanceolate. Perianth segments 

 5, broadly lanceolate, clothed with cottony wool, 3-nerved. Stamens 5, shortly 

 connate at base, anthers 2-celled, didymous. Ovary ovoid ; style slender, stigma 

 capitellate. Utricle enclosed in the perianth, ovoid, compressed, membranous. 

 Seeds ellipsoid t* inch long, i^ inch wide, black, and shining. 



Habitat: Natal: Near Durban, Peddie; Behmann, 8744; Coastland, Suther- 

 land ; and without precise locality, Qerrard 546 ; 476 ; Berea, near Durban, 200 feet 

 alt., June, Wood 11686. 



An annual herb with long straggling stems and branches, usually found at 

 edges of woods and thickets. According to the part of the Flora Capensis lately 

 published the genus includes 6 species in Tropical Africa, Masoarene Isles, and 

 Tropical Asia ; of these the above described species and P. lappacea are the only 

 two found in South Africa, the other species P. lappacea having been collected by 

 the writer in the " Thorns" near Weenen, at 3000 to 4000 feet alt., and so far 

 as at present known P. atropurpurea appears only to have been found in the 

 coast districts so far as Natal is concerned, and in the quotations of its collection 

 in other parts of South Africa the heights quoted are under 1000, under 500 and 

 under 200 feet. The hooked purple awns would most likely be injurious to wool. 



Fig. 1, stem with leaves and portion of branches; 2, upper portion of raceme; 

 3, a cluster of flowers ; 4, a bract; 5, bracteole; 6, flower ; 7, stamens; 8, pistil; 

 9, same, longitudinal section; 10, a seed; 11, cluster of spines and bract, 

 immature ; 1 2, same at maturity ; figs. 1 and 2 natural size, remainder enlarged. 



