185 
No. 31. 
Gmelina Leichhardtii, F.v.M. 
The White Beech. 
(Natural Order VERBENACE^E.) 
Botanical description. —Genus, Gmelina, Linn. 
Calyx. —Four or 5-toothed or sinuate-lobed. 
Corolla-tube. —Much dilated upwards, or almost campanulate ; limb oblique, with 4 or 5 spreading 
lobes, the two upper ones sometimes united in an upper lip. 
Stamens. —Four, in pairs, shorter than the corolla. 
Ovary. —Four-celled, with 1 ovule in each cell laterally attached at or above the middle; style 
filiform, unequally 2-lobed at the top. 
Fruit. —A succulent drupe, the putamen hard or bony, 4-celled or rarely 2-celled. 
Seeds. —Solitary in each cell, without albumen. 
Trees or tall shrubs. 
Leaves. —Opposite, undivided. 
Flowers. —Often rather large, pale purplish pink or blue, or in species not Australian yellow, in 
cymes arranged in irregular terminal panicles, sometimes almost reduced to simple racemes. 
Bracts small. 
Botanical description. —Species, G. Leichhardtii, F.v.M., in B.F1. v, 66. 
A fine timber tree, attaining a great height, the young branches and inflorescence tomentose. 
Leaves .—Ovate, scarcely acuminate but rather acute, rounded or cuneate at the base, 3 to 6 
inches long, somewhat coriaceous, quite glabrous, and almost rugose on the upper side, much 
reticulate, with raised veins and densely and softly tomentose underneath, the petiole often 
above 1 inch long. 
Floivers. —-“White, with purple markings,” numerous in opposite pedunculate cymes forming loose 
ovoid or shortly pyramidal terminal panicles. 
Calyx. —Broadly turbinate-eampanulate, truncate, tomentose, and not 2 lines long at the time of 
flowering, enlarged and spreading under the fruit. 
Corolla. —Villous outside, the tube very broad and dilated upwards, twice as long as the calyx, 
the lobes ovate, above 2 lines long, the two upper ones rather larger and shortly united in 
an upper lip. 
Stamens. —Incurved, the longer pair about as long as the upper lip; anther-cells diverging. 
Fruits. —In the specimens seen all deformed by insects, the calyx opening out horizontally to a 
diameter of 6 to 8 lines and obscurely sinuate-toothed. (B.F1. v, 66.) See p. 186. 
Botanical Name. — Gmelina, in honour of George Gmelin, a German 
naturalist and traveller (Georg Friedrich), author of a botanical work published at 
Tubingen in 1699. Leichhardtii is also in honour of a German naturalist and 
O 
traveller, an Australian explorer whose name is ever before the people of New South 
Wales and Queensland. 
A 
