PHANEROGAMS— PROFESSOR BAYLEY BALFOUR. 127 



Another very beautiful and strongly aromatic shrub. On the cliffs in the 

 higher parts of the island its long spreading branches run along the crevices, 

 sending up here and there from the glistening foliage short twigs with a few 

 heads of lilac flowers. It is one of the prettiest plants we have from the island. 



From the other Socotran species, as well as from all species of the genus, its 

 habit, inflorescence, and flowers widely separate it. Its bifid style is somewhat 

 exceptional in the genus. 



7. ACHYROCLINE. 



Achyrocline, Less. Syn. Comp. 332 ; Bentb. et Hook. Gen. PI. ii. 305. 



A small genus of mostly woolly half shrubby plants, included in about 

 twenty species. Mostly tropical American, but a few occur in tropical Africa 

 and Madagascar. Both Socotran species are spread in tropical Africa. 



1. A. luzuloides, Vatke in (Ester. Bot. Zeitschr. xxv. (1875), 326, and in 

 Linnsea xxxix. (1875), 489 (excl. appar. syn. A. sclerochlcena, Vatke) ; Oliv. 

 and Hiern in Oliv. Flor. Trop. Aft*, iii. 340. 



A. fflumacca, Oliv. and Hiern, loc. tit. 



Gnaphalium luzuloides, Schultz Bip. in herb. Schweinf. ' Nub. n. 397, and iu Schweinf. Flo.r. 



^Ethiop. 149. 

 Helichrymm glumaccum, DC. Prod. vi. 197 ; Ach. Rich. Tent. Flor. Abyss, i. 427. 



Socotra. Very common. B.C.S. n. 227. Schweinf. n. 492. Nimmo. 



Distrib. Nile Land, Upper Guinea, Somali Land. 



This plant occurs abundantly on the plains, and is a species showing con- 

 siderable variation. I accept the species as constituted by Vatke {loc. cit.), upon 

 Schweinfurth's specimens and Schimper's Abyssinian plants (sect. ii. n. 762); 

 but I include the Senegambian plant of Perottet, described by De Candolle, 

 which Vatke excludes, on what grounds I cannot determine. A misleading 

 misprint in Vatke's paper in Linn pea, makes A. sclerochlcena, a very different, 

 plant, appear as a synonym of this species. 



Oliver and Hiern {loc. cit.) regard Schimper's Abyssinian plants as 

 specifically distinct from Schweinfurth's Nubian ones, and under the name 

 A. ylumaceus, keep up the species described by Ach. Richard, and with it 

 doubtfully associate De Candolle's plant. I cannot confirm the diagnosis. 

 Though the plants have a somewhat different aspect of foliage, the glabrous 

 achenes of the Abyssinian plant — the chief character for diagnosis — are not 

 constant, and I have therefore reduced all the forms to one species. 



The receptacle, described as naked in A. luzuloides, is not always so. Fre- 

 quently it is conspicuously fimbrilliferous, and there are intermediate forms. 



This is one of the plants sent home from Socotra by Nimmo. 



