CXXIX. H^MODORACEiE. 1601 



2. -OPHIOPOGON, Ker. 

 (So called from its name of " Snake's-beard " in Japan or China. 



Perianth superior, tube none. Segments 6, distinct, spreading, oblong. 

 'Stamens 6, affixed to the base of the segments ; filaments short, erect ; anthers 

 oblong or linear. Ovary globose, 3-celled, with 2 ovules in each cell. Style 

 •erect, rather long, with a shortly 3-toothed stigma. Herbaceous perennial plants 

 with grass-like leaves, the fibrous roots often i thickening into tubers. Scape 

 leafless. 



An East Asiatic genus. 



1. O. japonicus (of Japan), Ker. in Bot. Mag., 1063. A grass-like stoloni- 

 iferous herbs, the roots often thickening into slender tubers. Leaves narrow- 

 linear, 3 to 6 inches long, 1 to 1 j line broad, 5 to 7-nerved. Scape 2 to 4 inches 

 long, naked, angular, bearing a loose raceme of a few flowers ; pedicels articulate, 

 drooping ; bracts lanceolate, scarious, 2 to 3 lines long. Perianth pale. Seeds 

 :globose. 



It is not quite clear whether this plant is indigenous or naturalised. It was found by Mr. W. 

 H. Kefford in the Three-mile Scrub near Brisbane a tew years ago. 



Order CXXX. IRIDACE^. 



Flowers hermaphrodite, regular or irregular. Perianth superior, with a short 

 ■or distinct tube, the limb of 6 petal-like segments, the three inner ones sometimes 

 very small. Stamens 3, inserted at the orifice of the tube or base of the inner 

 segments in all the Queensland species ; all fertile in the Queensland species. 

 ■Filaments free or united in a tube. Anther-cells 2, parallel, erect, opening 

 outwards. Style more or less divided into 3 lobes or branches, usually stigmatic 

 .at the end and sometimes broad and petal-like. Ovary inferior 3-celled, with 

 several often numerous ovules in each cell. Capsule opening loculicidally in 

 8 valves. Seeds albuminous, with a small embryo, the radicle next the hilum. 

 ' — Herbs with a perennial tuberous creeping bulbous or very short rhizom^e, rarely 

 •annuals. Leaves usually either radical or alternate and equitant, that is 

 distichous, sheathing and laterally flattened at the base, produced into a linear 

 lamina laterally or vertically not horizontally flattened so that the inner edge is 

 towards the stem, the outer edge a continuation of the keel of the sheath. 

 Flowers either solitary and terminal or in spikes or clusters within 1 or 2 bracts 

 often called spathes, the bracts within the cluster usually imbricate, but each 

 flower opposed to the bract of the same node, not in its axil. Perianths in the 

 Australian genera mostly blue white or rarely yellow. 



The Order is generally disposed over the New and the Old World, more abundant in 

 temperate than in tropical regions, and especially rich and diversified in South Africa. 

 The peculiar inflorescence of the several-flowered Iridece does not appear to have been 

 j;enerally noticed. It is a kind of cyme, each flower terminates an axis, which is continued 

 by the development of an axillary bud between the subtending bract and the flower, which 

 thus becomes opposed to the bract of the same node. As these subtending bracts are not 

 superposed and unilateral as in the ordinary forked cyme, but alternate along the branch, 

 •the rhachis assumes a zigzag not a scorpioid character. — Benth. 



Stjetbiee I. Sisyrinchie^e. — Rootstock very short, fibrous roots fascicles. , Spatha with 

 .2 or many flowers, very rarely 1-Jlowered. Perianth-tuhe none or very short, lobes spreading 

 equal or the inner ones u little larger or smaller than the outer. 



Three outer perianth-segments usually smaller than the inner bracts all 

 membranous and open. Filaments free 1. Libebtia. 



-The 6 perianth-segments nearly equal. Bracts membranous. Filaments 



connate below the middle or to the top. Capsule on long pedicels ... 2. SisyniNcnicir. 



