PLATE 381. 
VERNONIA MONOCEPHALA, Harv. (Fl. Cap. Vol. 3, p. 68). 
Natural Order, Composita. 
Herbaceous, branched from base, 1 to 2 feet high, branches simple or sub- 
simple, erect or ascending, striate, clothed with whitish hairs, especially on the 
younger parts. Leaves closely set on the central portion of the stem, alternate, 
sessile, narrowly oblong-lanceolate, entire, mucronate, ciliate with stiff, white 
hairs, and with similar scattered hairs on the surfaces, especially so on the midrib 
beneath ; 2 to 14 inch long in our specimens. Peduncle usually long and with a 
few (3-4) very narrow linear leaves, or sometimes leafy nearly to apex, 1-headed. 
Heads # to 1 inch wide, many flowered, flowers purple. Involucral scales linear- 
lanceolate, long acuminate, subpungent, erect or spreading, not squarrose, scabrous 
and setose with whitish hairs. Pappus dull white, the outer bristles short, inner 
much longer, both linear, serrate. Corolla 5-lobed, glandular externally. Anthers 
sagittate ; style arms finely pubescent. Achenes 5-7-ribbed, glandular. 
Habitat: Natau: Zululand, Gerrard & McKen, No. 1011; near Murchison, 
2000 feet alt, May, Wood, No. 3090; Van Reenen, 5-6000 feet alt, November, 
Wood, Nos. 4666, 6578, 6806. 
This plant is very like V. Gerrardi, but is easily distinguished from that 
species by its involucral scales not being squarrose, and also by its ribbed, glandular 
achenes, and both of these plants differ from V. Vernonella, by their acuminate 
involucral scales. In the Flora Capensis the achenes are said to be 10-ribbed, but 
we have not been able to distinguish more than 7 ribs, but the achenes in the heads 
examined were scarcely mature. The plant is confined to South Africa. 
Fig. 1, involucral scale; 2, floret; 3, inner pappus bristle; 4, outer pappus 
bristle; 5, stamens; 6, achenes; all enlarged. 
