KUNGL. SV. VET. AKADEMIENS HANDLINGAR. BAND 50. N:0 3- 41 



Thymelaeacese. 



Drapetes Lam. 



42. D. muscosus Lam. 



Flowers 5 — 6 at the top of the branches, surrounded by the uppermost leaves, 

 which are broader than the ordinary ones and form a true involucrum. Periantli 

 tube long and narrow, white, in the upper part hlac, lobes densely covered by 

 coarse hairs, with dark violet tips, filaments faint lilac, anthers mauve; ovary 

 green, style white, stigma violet. — The fJowers are entirely anemophilous, They 

 are proterog3mous ; as the stigma has already developed its slender papill», the anthers 

 are still hidden between the lobes of the calyx. Låter the filaments grow and on 

 the male (or homogamous) stage the anthers are long exserted, and well exposed 

 above the surface of the cnshions. The stigma is of a remarkable appearance; it is 

 flattened, dorsiventral and on the upper surface and round the börder densely covered 

 with very long, narrow cylindrical papillse. — Pl. II, Fig. 1 — 4. [The drawings in 

 HoMBR. & Jacq. (Decaisne), t. 18 are far from correct.] 



Widely spread över the Islands, but apparently local; in the Empetrum-heath. 

 E. F., Port Louis! Port Stanley! Mt. Simon (d'Urville). W. F., On the penin- 

 sula between Port Philomel and King George Bay, abundant ! summit of Mount 

 Adam! — • Magellan Straits, Fuegia. 



Myrtacese. 



MyrteoL*i Berg. 



99. M. nuininiilaria (PoiR.) Berg. (Myrtus nummularia PoiR.) 

 One of the common dwarf-shrubs of the heath and bogs: abundant in the E. 

 part of E. F. ! W. F., common! — S. Patagonia, Fuegia, Staten I. 



Mr. Wright (p. 318) has made the following curious statement, the source of 

 which he does not disclose: »The islands gained their Spanish name — Islas Ma- 

 louinas — owing to the Spaniards' non-approval of the tea made from the leaves of this 

 trailing vine. » Firstly, the Spanish name is not Malouinas, but Malvinas,^ and this 

 word is only a corruption of the French name, Malouines, a name given by the 

 French because of the frequent visits of ships from St. Malö, in the beginning of the 

 18tli century! This statement may be found in any cyclopedia ; it is repeated by 

 Governor Allardyce in his lecture on the islands (see Litter, 18). Besides, it is told 

 by HooKER in Fl. ant. p. 276 that the Gauchoes (from Argentina) in the islands 

 preferred the Myrteola-tea, to Chinese tea. 



' Mal vino = bad wine. Rem. of tlie author. 



K. Sv. Vet. Akad. Handl. Band. 50. N:o 3. 6 



