LXV. COMPOSITE. 821 



24. COLEOCOMA, F. v. M. 



(Pappus tubular.) 



Involucre ovoid, the bracts imbricfite in several rows, dry with slightly soarious 

 tips. Eeceptaole flat, without scales. Florets all tubular, those of the circum- 

 ference slender, female, 3 to 5-toothed ; disk-florets several, hermaphrodite, 

 sterile, 5-toothed. Anthers tailed. Style of the disk-florets usually undivided. 

 Achenes striate, somewhat compressed, those of the disk abortive. Pappus 

 of linear rigid scale-like bristles, those of the female florets united in a long tube, 

 jagged at the end, those of the disk-florets free almost to the base.^-Low rigid 

 herb. Leaves alternate, usually toothed. Flower-heads terminal or lateral. 



The genus consists but of a single species, endemic in Australia, differing from Fterigeron 

 only in the pappus. 



1. C. centaurea (like a Centaurea), F. v. M. 'in Hook. Kew Journ. ix. 19 ; 

 Benth. Fl. Austr. iii. 533. A low, rigid, erect, branching herb, perhaps annual, 

 although almost woody at the base, our specimens quite glabrous. Leaves 

 linear or lanceolate, acute, with a few small acute teeth, contracted at the base, 

 but the upper ones sessile or slightly decurrent. Flower-heads terminal and 

 sessile within the last leaves or at the base of the lateral branches. Involucre 4 

 to 5 lines long, the bracts very broad, the inner ones with short broad scarious 

 tips, jagged almost as in Centaurea. Florets yellow (F. v'. M.) Achenes rather 

 long, but much shorter than the involucre in our specimens, the tips of the 

 pappus of the sterile florets slightly protruding. — Hook. Ic. PI. t. 1186. 



Hab.: St. George, J. Wedd. 



25. EPALTES, Less. 

 (SphseromorphsBa, DC. (partly) ; Ethuliopsis, F. v. M.) 

 Involucre ovoid-globular or hemispherical, the bracts imbricate, usually broad 

 dry and rigid. Eeceptacle nearly flat, without scales. Florets all tubular, those 

 of the circumference numerous, female, very slender, minutely toothed, those of 

 the disk hermaphrodite, but usually sterile, broader, 8. to 5-toothed, either few or 

 the flower-heads almost dioecious. Anthers with minute tails or points at the 

 base. Style of the disk-flowers undivided or with short obtuse branches, papil- 

 lose outside. Achenes nearly terete, striate, those of the ray without any pappus, 

 those of the disk usually abortive and with a pappus of 2 or 3 very deciduous 

 bristles. — Herbs, either erect and dichotomous or diffuse. Leaves alternate, 

 entire, toothed or lobed. Flower-heads small in dichotomous cymes or lateral 

 and sessile. Involucral bracts very obtuse in the Australian species, more acute 

 in the Indian E. divaricata. 



A small genus, comprising, besides the 3 Australian species (2 of which are endemic, and 

 the other found in Formosa), at least one more, a common one in tropical Asia and 

 some parts of Africa. The genus is closely allied to Pluchea, differing chiefly in the absence 

 of any pappus to the fertile achenes. — Benth. 



Erect, dichotomously branched. Flower-heads ovoid-globular, terminal, 



and loosely clustered, often dioecious .... 1. E . Cunninghamii. 



Diffuse annual. Flower-heads hemispherical, lateral, sessile or nearly so 2. E. australis. 



Small weak annual of a few inches. Leaves almost obovate, narrowing 

 to the petiole. Involucre ovate, campanulate. Bracts acute. . . . S, E. Harrisii. 



1. E. Cunninghamii (after. Allan Cunnijigham), Benth. Fl, Austr. iii. 530. 

 Glabrous, erect, f to If ft. high, dichotomously branched; Leaves sessile and 

 half stem-clasping or sometimes slightly decurrent on the stem, oblong-lanceolate, 

 obtuse, irregularly tobthed, the upper ones small, narrow, and sometimes entire. 

 Flower-heads small, clustered at the ends of the branches of loose dichotomous 

 cymes. Involucres ovoid-globular, varying from 1 to 2 lines diameter, the bracts 

 very obtuse. Female florets not exceeding the involucre, in some specimens very 



