Cassythai] 
LAURACEiE. 
293 
flowering all the year, the root soon decaying. Stems copiously branched, 
extending to a length of 10 or 20 feet, twining round herbs and shrubs 
and adhering by suckers that penetrate their epidermis. Flowers 6-10, 
sessile, in short spreading peduncled spikes, with a bract at the base, the 
rachis flexuose ; bracteoles 3, ovate, persistent. Perianth T \ in. long ; 
lobes greenish white, the inner the largest. Fruit the size of a large 
pea, crowned by the 'persistent perianth-lobes. Wight , To. t. 1847. 
Mauritius, Seychelles and Rodriguez, at all elevations. Liane jaume. Liane 
sans Jin. 
3. HERNANDIA, Linn. 
Flowers monoicous, placed three together in a small involucre of 4 
oblong downy bracts, the central flower subsessile, female, enclosed in a 
cup-shaped nearly truncate involucel, the two outside ones pedicelled. 
male, without any involucel. Perianth downy, similar iu texture to 
the involucre, with a short funnel-shaped tube, and 6-10 oblong 
biseriate lobes. Male perianth with a 6-partite limb. Stamens 
3 or rarely 4, with monadelphous filaments inserted at the 
throat of the tube and glandular at the base ; anther oblong, 2- 
celled, dehiscing by the valves breaking away from the connec- 
tive. Female perianth with an 8-10-partite limb, witli the stamens 
represented only by glands at the throat. Ovary minute ; style cylin- 
drical, pilose ; stigma irregularly lobed. Fruit globose, indehiscent, 
enclosed in both the accrescent calyx-tube and involucel, which 
latter becomes a membranous bag much larger than the fruit. — Trees, 
with long petioled alternate broad ovate leaves, the small flowers in 
peduncled corymbose panicles from the axils of the upper leaves. 
Distrib. Cosmopolitan in the tropics. Species 6. 
Petiole inserted at the base of the blade 1. H. ovigera 
Petiole inserted above the base of the blade 2. H. peltata 
1. H. ovigera, Linn. ; Meism. in DC. Prod. xv. 262. A tree 30-40 
feet high, with stout glabrous branchlets. Leaves broad ovate-cordate, 
4-6 in. long, deltoid at the tip, subcoriaceous, green and quite glabrous ou 
both surfaces, with the petiole inserted at the base, and 7 veins radiating 
from its apex ; petiole 3-4 in. long. Peduncle as long as or shorter than 
the petiole ; flowers in corymbose panicles with grey canescent branch- 
lets and minute lanceolate bracts. Lobes of the involucre obovate, 
obtuse, grey, downy, % in. long. Lobes of the perianth oblong, ^ in. 
long. Filaments each with two glands at the base. Fruit globose, 
an inch long. 
Mauritius, on the damp forests of Trois Hots and Grandport, now become rare , 
Bouton ! Tropical Asia and Africa. Bois Blanc. 
2. H. peltata, Meissn. in DC. Prod. xv. 263. A large tree, 
glabrous beyond the panicle. Leaves ovate-deltoid, |-1 ft. long, 
deltoid at the apex, truncate or slightly cordate at the base, subcori- 
