94 



MEMOIRS OF THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN [Vol. 9, No. 1 



1946, 16119a, Kota-kota District: Chia area, muddy edges of waterholes, herb 

 30-50 cm. high, ascending, fleshy, flowers pink, 480 m., Sept. 3, 1946, 17512, 

 Widespread in tropical Africa; common on the eastern side, rarer on the western. 



P ALMAE 



Phoenix reclinata J acq. Fragm. 1: 27. pi. 24, 1801; C. H. Wright in Thiselton- 

 Dyer, Fl. Trop. Afr. 8: 103. 1901. 

 Cholo District: Cholo Mountain, frequent on edges of rain-forest, and in sec- 

 ond growths, up to about 20 m. high, clumps of several, usually crooked stems, 

 leaves numerous, arched and spreading, 3-3.5 m. long, spadices several, drooping 

 and the peduncles orange-coloured when in fruit, fruits orange-yellow, reddish- 

 brown when thoroughly ripe, peduncles 1-1.2 m. long, photographs, 1200 m., Sept. 

 2, 1946, 17750, Widespread in tropical Africa. 



Raphia sp. 



Kota-kota District: Nchisi Mountain, small clump on wet stream-banks in 

 Bracbystegia woodland (planted by natives ?), about 6 m. tall, stemless, leaf- 

 segments glaucous beneath, midribs reddish beneath, native name chiwale, 1400 

 m., Aug. 5, 1946, 17131*, 



To name this plant specifically fruits are wanted. 



ARACEAE 



Sauromatum venosum (Ait.) Kunth, Enum. PI. 3: 28. 1841; Schott, Prodr. Syst. 

 Aroid. 71. I860. 

 Arum venosum Ait. Hort. Kew. 3: 315. 1789. 

 Arum guttatum Wall. PI. As. Rar. 2: 10. pi. 115. 1831. 



Sauromatum guttatum (Wall.) Schott in Schott & Endl. Meletem. 17. 1832; Engl. Pflan- 



zenreich 73(4 23F ): 123. 1920. 

 Sauromatum nubicum Schott, Syn. Aroid. 25. 1856; N.E.Br, in Thiselton-Dyer, Fl. Trop. 



Afr. 8: 141. 1901. 



Cholo District: Cholo Mountain, one example in rain-forest regrowths, herb 

 30 cm. high, rhizome irregular, depressed globose, about 8 cm. in diameter, in- 

 florescence very fragrant, spathe reflexed, brownish-green without, yellowish- 

 green blotched with maroon within, margins of limb incurved, sterile apex of 

 spadix # brownish-green, 1200 m., Sept. 21, 1946, 17717*, India, Burma, Sumatra, 

 Ubangi-Shari, French Cameroons, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Eritrea, Abyssinia, 

 Kenya, Tanganyika Territory, and Nyasaland. 



N.E. Brown and Engler distinguished the African from the Asiatic plant as 

 S. nubicum. Brown, basing his description chiefly on a single cultivated speci- 

 men, distinguished S. nubicum from the Asiatic plant, which he called S. guttatum, 

 by the rather shorter and much less clavate neuter organs. Engler also used these 

 organs, saying that they were [transl.] <c less numerous ... and more thickened 

 below, sometimes (in a Kilamanjaro specimen) thinly clavate, almost filiform." 

 S. guttatum was said to have them "stipitate-claviform." Engler maintained, in 

 addition, that the spathe of S. nubicum was narrower than that of S. guttatum, 



S. venosum is a variable plant, but the several specimens which have by now 

 been collected in tropical Africa convince me that there is no separation to be 

 made between the African and Asiatic plants, either on shape of spathe or of the 

 neuter organs, the supposed differences being trivial and quite inconstant. 



