668 PHANEROGAMIA. 



Hab. Samoan or Navigators' Islands (Tutuila ?) : on mountains at 

 the elevation of 2,500 feet. 



A shrub or tree ; with nodose, hirsutely pubescent branches. Leaves 

 opposite, oval, or elliptical, simple, membranaceous or chartaceous in 

 texture, 21 to 5 inches long, from one to 3 inches wide, on hairy 

 petioles from half an inch to an inch and a half in length, rounded at 

 the base, somewhat pointed or acute at the apex, serrulate with sharp 

 teeth, prominently pinnately veined with 9 to 11 pairs of veins, gla- 

 brate, except the midrib and veins underneath. Stipules inter- 

 petiolar, oblong, obtuse, entire, membranaceous, sparsely hairy outside, 

 half an inch long, caducous. Flowers polygamo-dicecious, very small, 

 greenish, in ample, compound and loose, pubescent panicles usually 

 exceeding the leaves. These arise from the upper axils, or are some- 

 times terminal. Peduncles longer than the petioles. Principal 

 bracts lanceolate or linear, opposite, or rarely quaternate, deciduous. 

 Pedicels crowded, sometimes fascicled, a line or two in length, articu- 

 lated in the middle. Flower-buds a line long. Calyx more or less 

 pubescent outside, either four-cleft or five-cleft, or rarely even six- 

 cleft; the segments ovate-triangular, valvate in aestivation. Corolla 

 none. Stamens twice as many as the segments of the calyx, and 

 inserted upon its very base, almost or entirely hypogynous, distinct : 

 filaments filiform, glabrous, in the sterile flowers twice the length of 

 the calyx, in the fertile flowers rather shorter than the calyx, persis- 

 tent : anthers didymous, two-celled; the cells opening lengthwise. 

 Glands of the disk hypogynous and scale-like ; in the sterile flowers 

 as many as the lobes of the calyx, oblong, toothed at the apex, more 

 or less coalescent in the centre of the flower ; in the fertile flowers as 

 many as the stamens and alternate with them, nearly half the length 

 of the ovaries, cuneate-oblong, flat, truncate at the apex and usually 

 emarginate. Gynaacium abortive or entirely wanting in the sterile 

 flowers; in the fertile consisting of as many perfectly distinct and 

 free pistils as there are lobes to the calyx. Ovaries ovoid-fusiform, 

 pubescent, alternate with the calyx-lobes, tapering into a short persis- 

 tent style, which is tipped with an obtuse somewhat capitate stigma. 

 Ovules 2, collateral, pendulous from near the middle of the ventral 

 suture, almost anatropous : the chalazal extremity considerably ex- 

 tended or appendaged. Follicles two-seeded, not seen mature, when 

 unripe twice the length of the persistent calyx, silky-pubescent, some- 



