Guar. IL. MAURANDIA. 67 
their young and sensitive petioles. These petioles, 
when lightly rubbed, move after a considerable interval 
of time, and subsequently become straight again. A 
loop of thread weighing 3th of a grain caused them to 
bend. 
Maurandia semperflorens—This freely growing 
species climbs exactly like the last, by the aid of its 
sensitive petioles. A young internode made two 
circles, each in 1 hr. 46 min.; so that it moved almost 
twice as rapidly as the last species. The internodes 
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 Vallisneria. 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 
