906 CIV. POLYGONACB^. [Brunnichia- 



and wide, not milky ; branches elongate-virgate, horizontally patent 

 or even bent downwards and nodding, angular, oirrhose ; tendrils bifid 

 at the apex ; leaves papery, bright green and glossy above, paler 

 beneath, oblong or elliptical-ovate, abruptly narrowed at both ends 

 or wedged-shaped at the base ; petiole amplexicaul, forming a short 

 ochrea ; flower-racemes not oirrhose at the apex but the peduncles or 

 the branchlets from the axils of the leaves below the inflorescence 

 transformed into tendrils of 2 to 4 in. long ; perianth obversely fusiform ^ 

 jointed to the much compressed pedicel, compressed- winged, connate 

 with the base of the ovary, the limb 5-partite, the segments oonvolute- 

 semi-imbricate in aestivation, patent during the flowering, herbaceous- 

 green outside, rosy-red inside ; stamens 10 or very rarely only 5, 

 inserted on the throat of the perianth, 5 of them, those opposite the 

 perianth-segments, a little longer than the others, flattened from the 

 base, filiform, exserted ; anthers rotundate-cordate, very deep vermilion- 

 red, introrse, 2-celled, the cells cohering only at the point of insertion 

 of the filaments, dehiscing longitudinally ; ovary nearly free, fusiform, 

 trigonous, terminating gradually in the style ; stigmas 3, delicately- 

 capitate ; ovary 1-celled, 1-ovuled ; the ovule erect, seated at the base- 

 on the thick column or funicle ; fruit with the winged pedicel vividly 

 blood-red, 5 to 7 times as long as the perianth. In rather dense 

 primitive forests by streams among the mountains in Sobato de Bumba. 

 and at the Capopa cataract near Sange, sporadic ; fl. and fr., 28 Sept. 

 1855 ; in company with Bombax huonqpozensis P. Beauv. (Welw. 

 herb. no. 5413), Leea guineensis G. Don (Welw. herb. no. 1487, and 

 Trymatococam hamerunensis Engl,, var. Welwitschii Engl. (Welw. herb, 

 no. 2594). No. 1754. At Oapopa ; fr. April 1856. Coll. Caep. 982. 



CV. PODOSTEMACE^. 



The plants of this order have, a remarkably peculiar habit 

 resembling in this respect some Algse and Jungermanniae ; tbey 

 are poorly represented in Angola, Welwitsch having collected 

 only two out of the 170 species or thereabouts in all; these two 

 species, moreover, were found each in a single station, namely in 

 the cool and clear streams confined within rooks among the 

 mountains of Pungo Andongo, though they were searched for in 

 vain in similar situations up to 16° S. Lat. and 5600 feet of 

 altitude. One of the species strikingly resembles a Hypnea. 

 (Floridece), and it grows with a shield-like knotty base 

 attached in an exactly similar fashipn to stones at the bottom 

 of the streams. The second species, which at first sight might 

 be mistaken for a Jung&rmarmia, occurs also at the bottom of 

 streams, but it grows in dense extensive tufts after the mfinner of 

 various Jtmgermannice. Each of the species seems rarely to bear- 

 fruit and then only when the streams in which they grow decrease 

 so much in depth by evaporation in the hot season that the 

 plants have their upper branches exposed to the atmosphere. The 

 texture also of these species resembles that of some Algse ; they 

 have the same elastic stiffness when taken fresh out of the water, 

 the same rapid crumbling, the same knot-like appearance of the 

 stem (though on closer examination really different), and fehe 

 same kind of cartilaginous disk at the point of attachment. 



