Chap. U. MAURANDIA. 67 



their young and sensitive petioles. These petioles, 

 when lightly rubbed, moye after a considerable interval 

 of time, and subsequently become straight again. A 

 loop of thread weighing |th of a grain caused them to 

 bend. 



Maurandia semperfiorens. — This freely growing 

 species climbs exactly like the last, by the aid of its 

 sensitive petioles. A young intemode made two 

 circles, each in 1 hr. 46 min. ; so that it moved almost 

 twice as rapidly as the last species. The intemodes 

 are not in the least sensitive to a touch or pressure. I 

 mention this because they are sensitive in a closely allied 

 genus, namely, Lophospermum. The present species is 

 unique in one respect. Mohl asserts (p. 45) that " the 

 flower-peduncles, as well as the petioles, wind like 

 tendrils;" but he classes as tendrils such objects 

 as the spiral flower-stalks of the ValKsneria. This 

 remark, and the fact of the flower-peduncles being 

 decidedly flexuous, led me carefully to examine 

 them. They never act as true tendrils ; I repeatedly 

 placed thin sticks in contact with young and old 

 peduncles, and I allowed nine vigorous plants to 

 grow through an entangled mass of branches ; but 

 in no one instance did they bend round any object. 

 It is indeed in the highest degree improbable that 

 this should occur, for they are generally developed on 

 branches which have already securely clasped a 

 support by the petioles of their leaves; and when 

 borne on a free depending branch, they are not 

 produced by the terminal portion of the internode 



