PLATE 360. 
Emex austratis, Steinh (Fl. Australiensis, Vol. V., p. 262). 
Natural Order, Potyconaces. 
A prostrate plant with monoecious green flowers, and thorny seed vessels, 
glabrous in all parts. Stems prostrate, reaching to three feet or more long, 
several from a half woody rootstock, terete, striate, green or tinged with red 
especially towards the base, bark tough. Leaves alternate, petiolate, stipulate, 
oblong or oblong-ovate, very obtuse and rounded at apex, broad and truncate or 
nearly cordate at base, margins quite entire, veins pinnate; 2 to 7 inches long, 1} 
to 43 wide; petiole channelled above, especially in upper portion where it is 
margined by the decurrent lamina of the leaf; 3 to 7 inches long. Stipules thin 
and scarious, sheathing the stem but soon deciduous. Inflorescence axillary in 
whorl-like clusters on an elongated peduncle, some female flowers sessile at its 
base, a few mixed with the male flowers in lower half of the peduncle, the upper 
ones all male. Male flowers ; perianth 3 to 5-lobed, segments concave. Stamens 
3 to 6, filaments equalling perianth segments; anthers oblong, 2-celled. Female 
flowers ; perianth tube turbinate, 6-lobed, 3 of the lobes much larger than the 
alternate ones and spinescent, the whole perianth enlarged and hardening in fruit. 
Ovary free, 3-angled, l-seeded ; styles 3, stigmas fringed on inner side, lacerate 
above. Fruit enclosed in the hardened perianth, the 3 longer lobes of which are 
divaricate, and spinous, the 3 smaller ones ovate, acute, erect, not spinous. 
Habitat; Natat: Near Durban, 120 feet alt., June, Wood No. 9470. 
A troublesome weed known to the young people as “ Devil’s thorn” as the 
seed vessels lie on the ground one of the thorns is always erect or nearly so, and 
therefore likely to inflict painful wounds, and the plant would most likely become 
a pest in sheep farming districts, but fortunately it is at present almost confined 
to the coast districts, though I have met with it at an altitude of 2,000 feet, and it 
is quite possible that it may find its way still farther into the highlands of the 
Colony. . 
A note in the Flora Australiensis says of the plant. ‘A common maritime 
plant in South Africa, differing slightly from the Mediterranean species (E. 
spinosa, Campd.) in the larger fruiting perianth, less rugose, the spinescent 
segments longer, and the inner erect ones broader and more rounded.” 
Mr. Andrew Smith, M.A., in his work on medicinal plants of the Cape Colony, 
says of this plant: “ The leaves are boiled and used as a cabbage in biliousness. 
and also for creating an appetite. They are mildly purgative and diuretic.” 
Fig. 1, male flower ; 2, a stamen ; 3, female flower ; 4, ovary and stigmas ; 
5, stigmas enlarged ; 6, fruiting perianth ; 7, cross section of fruit; all enlarged. 
