Kew Herbarium Research Articles

Notes on Albizia niopoides (Spruce ex Benth.) Burkart (Leguminosae: Mimosoideae)

A. niopoides is a potential multipurpose tree due to its large shade-giving crown with a diameter up to 20 m (data from herbarium labels of Venezuelan populations), its tolerance of dry areas, its hard wood of high quality (which is used for railway sleepers), and its usually large production of fruits for forage (data taken from herbarium labels). Alongside the main focus on Leucaena and Gliricidia, Albizia species have been collected and studied by the Oxford Forestry Institute during the last 10 years as trees of potential use for tropical reafforestation (ODA Research scheme R-4091) and A. niopoides has been extensively collected within this research programme. Recently, while dealing with a query from the Oxford Forestry Institute about an Indian species of Albizia, I found an isotype of Albizia richardiana King & Prain in the Kew herbarium. This also corresponds to A. niopoides. In the protologue of A. richardiana a brief history of the material on which this name is based is explained. The tree was first cultivated in the Royal Botanic Garden, Calcutta in 1841 and it was believed, erroneously, to be a native of Madagascar. According to King & Prain (in King, Duthie & Prain 1906), seeds of this plant were received by Wallich with a note stating "Gagnebina spec. Bel arbre de Madagascar". Later, Voigt (1845) listed it as Gagnebina richardiana Wall. In the original description of A. richardiana (King & Prain 1906) there is a drawing of the plant and a photograph of the whole tree showing the characteristic bark and wide crown typical of A. niopoides. A. niopoides is more widely distributed than previously thought and the relevant synonymy is presented below.

A New Species of Plectranthus (Labiatae) from Malawi and Adjacent Countries

One of the commonest of the many species of Plectranthus in Malawi is a very viscid, erect, blueor purplish-flowered annual species which is widespread in all three regions of the country. It flowers in the late rains and during the dry season, and may be conspicuous when little else is flowering. Although fairly abundant collections of the species are now available, including a few from Tanzania, Mozambique and Zimbabwe, it seems never to have been named, and has become well known in the Kew herbarium as 'Plectranthus sp. 16'. We have pleasure in here naming the species in honour of Dr J. H. Seyani, director of the National Herbarium and Botanic Gardens of Malawi, who has had an interest in Plectranthus for some time (see Kew Bull. 42: 687 699 (1987)) and is familiar with this species in the field.

A New Species of Turraea (Meliaceae) from Somalia and a Note on the Species in Continental Africa

During the autumn of 1988, Dr Lobin of the University of Saarbrucken, W. Germany, visited the Kew Herbarium in order to obtain names for the botanical collections that he had made in Somalia, and also for those accumulated by Mr Ralf Peveling at the Balcad Nature Reserve (Anon. 1987) near Mogadishu. Amongst the specimens made by the latter was found an undescribed species of Turraea which matched three other fragmentary collections in the Kew herbarium. These had been annotated by Mr. Jan Gillett as 'Turraea parvifolia Deflers forma vel sp. aff.' and reference is made to them by Kuchar (1986). In fact, the curved staminal tube and large ovoid receptaculum pollinis of Peveling's species suggest an equally close link with the predominantly Kenyan species Turraea fischeri Guerke and Turraea cornucopia Styles & White.

A New Combination for a Malawian Peristrophe (Acanthaceae)

Some 20 years ago, realising that the syntypes of Dicliptera aculeata C. B. Clarke are in fact referable to Peristrophe and fall into the complex centred on P. paniculata (Forssk.) Brummitt (formerly known as P. bicalyculata (Retz.) Nees), I transferred the material in the Kew herbarium accordingly. However, the combination has not hitherto been published. In the concept of Balkwill (1985) P. paniculata is an annual with a corolla 6-14 mm long. Plants from various parts of tropical Africa which have commonly been referred to this species but are perennials with a corolla 17-27 mm long, often also having their flowers aggregated into rather dense clusters, have apparently to be excluded from P. paniculata. Most distinctive among such plants are those from northern Malawi, including the syntypes of D. aculeata, cited below. The relationship of these to other perennial plants in this complex with less conspicuously aggregated flowers, which occur in the rest of Malawi and elsewhere, remains to be determined. Meanwhile, floristic work requires publication of the appropriate combination in Peristrophe. I am grateful to Dr K. Balkwill for his comments and support.

Notes on Madagascan Euphorbiaceae III: Stachyandra

Whilst I was working through a pile of undetermined material at the end of the Euphorbiaceae in the Kew Herbarium in 1964, my attention was drawn to two specimens, one sterile and one fruiting, collected by the Rev. R. Baron in northern Madagascar. These had lain there undisturbed since 1892, when they had been received at Kew, apart from a pencilled note at the bottom of each sheet, "near Croton?". These were Baron 6431 and 6441 respectively. They clearly had nothing whatever to do with Croton, since the growthpattern was monopodial and the leaves were opposite and decussate, and, furthermore, digitately compound. The most striking feature, however, about them was the curious stipular sheath terminating each shoot, to which the petioles were adnate for almost all their length, so that the leaflets appeared to arise from the top of a terminal bud. I brought these specimens to the notice of Mr Airy Shaw, who up to that time appeared to have been unaware of them, and I made drawings showing their diagnostic features which I sent to Paris. I later received a letter from Mme Tardieu-Blot, then a Sub-Director of the Laboratoire de Phandrogamie at the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle, to the effect that she had been able to question the doyen of Madagascan forestry and botany, Monsieur R. Capuron, concerning them. He considered them to represent the same unnamed species as one with which he was already familiar, having encountered it many times in the field, albeit always in a sterile condition, where it often occurred in pure stands. He opined it to be referable to the genus Androstachys Prain (Capuron 1957). Mme Tardieu also sent my drawings to her fellow Sub-Director, the late J. Leandri, then on vacation in Corsica. I received a rather non-committal reply from him expressing surprise that there was so little material available from a region 'qui a 6t6 explor6e soigneusement par les meilleurs botanistes malgaches'. He had, however, some years previously made brief mention of Capuron's plants in his account of Androstachys for the 'Flore de Madagascar et des Comores' (Leandri 1958), but did not refer to this fact in his letter. In 1965, Airy Shaw published a short informal note on the Baron specimens when he established the family Androstachydaceae as a precursor to his revision of Willis' 'Dictionary' (Airy Shaw 1965).

Ligustrum (Oleaceae) in Southern India

Summary. A critical review of the material in the Kew Herbarium of Ligustrum from the Western Ghats, including some recent collections, has led to the conclusion that only one species, L. perrottetii A.DC., should be recognized, although one or two aberrant forms need to be studied in the field. The presentation to Kew of several recently collected specimens of Ligustrum from the Palni Hills by Dr K. M. Matthew of the Rapinat Herbarium, Tiruchirapalli, Tamil Nadu, has led to a review of the genus in southern India. This has revealed that within the limited range of characters available, the members of this genus from this area are found to be particularly variable, and do not form discrete entities which may be recognized taxonomically. In fact, there appears to be only one variable species. In the past various botanists have attempted to separate species and varieties on, for example, density and pubescence of the inflorescence or the size, texture and shape of the leaves, but the groups that have been recognized are not clearcut. This lack of discrete taxa is borne out by the impossibility of devising a workable identification key to those that have been recognized in the past. The problems in this group are also reflected in the extensive synonymy, which has been complicated by authors' frequent modification of the previously used names by such phrases as 'sensu' and 'pro parte'. Furthermore, Dr Matthew informs me that in the field there appear to be no ecological reasons for this variability, nor do there seem to be characters, not apparent from dried specimens, such as those of habit etc., which might be helpful taxonomically. However, a more detailed study, based on the observation of living populations, might perhaps reveal a pattern in the variation not discernible with the material at present available.

Corticioid Fungi Described by M. J. Berkeley

Summary. Ninety species of Corticium Fr. described by the Rev. M. J. Berkeley alone or together with others are considered. The holotype of each species is cited and the position or synonyms of the name are indicated. The following new combinations are proposed: Phanerochaete emplastra (Corticium emplastrum Berk. & Br.); Ceraceomyces simulans (Corticium simulans Berk. & Br.); and Porostereum lilacinum (Corticium lilacinum Berk. & Br.) Lectotypes are designated for the following: Corticium chtysocreas Berk. & Curtis: USA, South Carolina, Ravenel, Fung. Car. V:27; Corticium ephebium Berk. & Curtis: USA, Alabama, Peters 6050; Corticium glabrum Berk. & Curtis: USA, Car. Inf., Ravenel 2404; Corticium scutellare Berk. & Curtis: USA, Ravenel 1584 and Corticium tremellinum Berk. & Rav.: USA, Ravenel 1649. All specimens in Kew herbarium. The Rev. Miles Joseph Berkeley was born in 1803 at Biggin Hall near Oundle in Northamptonshire. He was educated at Cambridge, ordained as an Anglican priest and was finally appointed as Vicar of Sibbertoft, Market Harborough, about 25 km from his place of birth. He died in July 1889. A brief presentation of Berkeley's life was published by Ainsworth (1979). Berkeley, 'the Father of British Mycology', was almost of the same age as Elias Fries, 'The Linnaeus of Mycology', who was born in 1794. They corresponded over many years and also exchanged collections. During his long life he was an immensely productive mycologist. Berkeley described, mostly together with other mycologists or collectors, an enormous quantity of new taxa in all groups of fungi from different parts of the world. These included hundreds of corticioid species, principally in the genera Corticium Fr. and Hydnum L. The generic concept of the corticioid fungi at that time was simple. Smooth species were normally placed in Corticium or later, when Peniophora was established by Cooke (1879), this genus was used for taxa with metuloids. The genus Hydnum was adapted both for resupinate and pileate species with strongly spinulose or denticulate hymenophores. For species with shorter teeth, the genus Odontia Fr. was applicable, and those with colliculose hymenophores the genus Grandinia Fr. Only the basidiome was used, with very few exceptions, as a morphological criterion by Berkeley and the micromorphology was of minor significance. Spore measurement and the structure of basidia and cystidia were rarely mentioned in the description of the corticioid fungi. This would explain why so many of the species today are either found to belong to other groups or synonymized. A considerable problem in interpreting Berkeley's species is that many specimens have been more or less damaged by early chemical treatment against insect attack. Further, the fungi were often pressed like flowers, a faulty method. After Berkeley's death, some 'herbarium names' were described by Cooke and others, but these species are not dealt with in this paper. All specimens mentioned below are preserved at Kew, unless otherwise indicated. Isotypes or other material in the protologue are as a rule not studied or mentioned,

Two New Species of Polycarpaea (Caryophyllaceae) from Somalia

For some years now, material of some very striking cushion-forming plants has been accumulating at the end of the Caryophyllaceae, in both the Kew Herbarium and the East African Herbarium in Nairobi, in folders marked '?gen. nov.?'. These have much-branched woody stems covered with subulate leaves and with tiny pedunculate inflorescences. They were re-examined in the course of preparing an account of the Caryophyllaceae for the Flora of Ethiopia and it became clear that they had many features in common with some species of Polycarpaea, most notably P. spicata Wight ex Arn. and the very remarkable Limonium-like P. kuriensis Wagner, known only from the island of Abd al Kuri near Socotra.

Notes on the Orchids of Southern Tropical Africa III: Aerangis

When the revision of the African species of Aerangis was published (Stewart 1979), only two species in which the flowers have long spurs at the base of the lip, A. kotschyana and A. verdickii, were recorded from Malawi. Within a few years other plants with dark green leaves and long-spurred white flowers have been collected in that country. At first they were thought to be two distinct forms of A. brachycarpa (la Croix et al. 1983) since they seemed to be more similar to that species than to any other. Now that the plants have been grown in cultivation for several years, both in Malawi and at Kew, and a number of specimens have been studied in the herbarium, we realise that they are quite different from that species, as well as from each other, in several ways. We therefore name, describe and illustrate them in this paper and discuss other collections from Malawi in the Kew herbarium. We should also point out that this interpretation of the available material indicates that A. brachycarpa, which is widely distributed in eastern Africa from Ethiopia in the' north to Zambia and Angola in the south, has not been recorded, as yet, from Malawi.

Notes on the Orchids of Southern Tropical Africa, II. Oligophyton drummondii, gen. et sp. nov.

This new species was first collected by Ball in 1954, and was regarded by Greatrex and Summerhayes (in litt.) as being a species of Schizochilus. The first author studied this collection in 1979, while working at the Bolus Herbarium, and also treated it as a Schizochilus, but fortunately Mrs J. Stewart pointed out that it was much more similar to Benthamia. In 1982 the second author studied the material in SRGH, in connection with the orchid account for the Flora Zambesiaca. With the first author being at Kew Herbarium, it was possible to study the suggested relatives of the taxon, and to produce the present account. Both dried and spirit preserved material from SRGH was studied in detail. Due to the small size of the flowers, and the critical nature of the column, the material was studied by scanning electron microscopy. Flowers were dissected, dried by the critical point process in a Balzars Union CPD 010, using CO2 as the exchange medium, coated with platinum in a Balzars Union SCD 030, and photographed with a Hitachi S 510 scanning electron microscope at 15 kV acceleration.

Notes on Asiatic and New Guinea Orchidaceae

Summary. Two new taxa, Peristylus superanthusJ. J. Wood and Bulbophyllum ambrosia (Hance) Schltr. subsp. nepalensis J. J. Wood, from Nepal, and two varieties of Dendrobium subclausum Rolfe from Papua New Guinea are described. Kuhlhasseltia halconensis J. J. Wood is proposed as a new name for Herpysma merrillii Ames. Five new combinations, viz. Peristylus nematocaulon (J. D. Hook.) J. J. Wood, Anoectochilus luzonensis (Ames) J. J. Wood, Glomera pendulata (P. Royen) J. J. Wood, Bulbophyllum masonii (Senghas) J. J. Wood and Flickingeria puncticulosa (J. J. Sm.) J. J. Wood are made. The synonymy and infraspecific variability of Dendrobium subclausum is discussed and two new varieties proposed here. Pedilochilus oreadum P. Royen is considered conspecific with P. obovatum J. J. Sm. A considerable number of Asiatic and New Guinea orchids are received at Kew each year for identification. The following taxonomic notes have accumulated as a result of these studies on both living and preserved material. The genera follow the modified Schlechter sequence used in the Kew Herbarium. Peristylus nematocaulon (J. D. Hook.) J. J. Wood comb. nov.

An Endemic Ischaemum (Gramineae) from Christmas Island

In the Kew herbarium, five similar specimens of Ischaemum from Christmas Island each carry a determinavit label signed by Stapf and bearing the name Ischaemum nativitatis Stapf. This name, however, was never formally published by Stapf. There is no date on the determinavit labels but they were presumably all affixed at the same time and since Ridley's two collections of 1904 are included they must have been put on after that date. Ridley in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, Straits Branch 45: 243 (1906) included in his list of plants for the island the name Ischaemumfoliosum Hack. var. leiophyllum Hack. Ridley gave a note on distribution and habitat, but no diagnosis or description was provided for this variety and although no specimens were cited I assume that Hackel's name applies to the two Ridley collections of Ischaemum to which Stapf affixed the determinavit labels bearing the name Ischaemum nativitatis. At the time of both Ridley's collections and Stapfs study only this one species of Ischaemum was known from Christmas Island.

Acanthostelma, a New Genus of Acanthaceae from Somalia

In the course of a survey of the genus Neuracanthus Nees our attention has focused on the endemic Somalian species N. thymifolius Chiov. Until the last decade only two specimens of this species were found in the Kew herbarium, and both had been identified as 'Barleria sp.'. In the last few years several new collections have been made, and have been correctly identified by Mr J. B. Gillett in Nairobi as N. thymifolius. The general aspect of this species is quite unlike that of other species of Neuracanthus, and close examination reveals numerous characters to distinguish it at generic level.

A Remarkable Cyathea Hybrid

I recently discovered, in Herbarium at Kew, specimens of a hybrid Cyathea plant cultivated at Birmingham, England Botanical Gardens in 1890 and of two plants stated to have been parents of hybrid. The specimens were sent to Kew by W. B. Latham, who was Curator of Birmingham Gardens from 1868 to 1903. The only published reference to hybrid known to me is in an account of his career by Latham (1901), in which he stated that he raised hybrid about 1870 and that parent species were the Mexican Cyathea insignis and Norfolk Island Alsophila excelsa; he did not give a distinctive name to hybrid. He also referred to a Dicksonia hybrid which he raised in 1862 and which was named D. lathamii by Thomas Moore (1885). Thus Latham was a pioneer in fern hybridizing, although he is not mentioned in book by E. J. Lowe on subject. Lowe (1895, p. 11) recorded that when he began experiments in 1851, Thomas Moore and others told him that hybridization of ferns was impossible; for comments on Lowe's work as recorded in his book, see Lovis (1967). Although Latham accepted nomenclature which placed in different genera parent plants of his Cyathea hybrid, he evidently recognized their close relationship. They both belong to Cyathea subg. Sphaeropteris in my arrangement of Cyatheaceae of Old World (Holttum, 1963, 1964), where about 100 species of subgenus are recognized. In 1970, R. M. Tryon recognized Sphaeropteris as a distinct genus, including in it not only American species mentioned by me (1963, p. 124), but also several others which in my judgement are quite unrelated. The six American species which I regard as true Sphaeropteris were described by Tryon (1971) as the group of Sphaeropteris horrida. In this group, two species are closely allied; they are named by Tryon S. insignis (D. C. Eaton) Tryon (from Greater Antilles) and S. horrida (Liebm.) Tryon (from southern Mexico). Baker (1874, p. 17) united two as Cyathea insignis D. C. Eaton, but in cultivation Mexican species became known as C. princeps E. Mayer, and Latham so named specimen of Mexican parent of his hybrid; see Tryon (1971) for a full synonymy. Latham's specimen is sterile, but its scales indicate that it belongs either to S. insignis or to S. horrida, as named by Tryon. Latham said that it came from Mexico, and by comparison with specimens in Kew herbarium I judge that he was right. The specimen certainly does not belong to any Old World indusiate species of subg. Sphaeropteris.

The Identity of Calpurnia uarandensis Chiov. (Leguminosae)

Calpurnia uarandensis Chiov. was described in 1929 on the basis of the collection Puccioni & Stefanini 501 (FT) from between Adani and Uarandi in central Somalia. The species is a glabrous shrub and the type collection consists of a branch with some precocious inflorescences and a few, very young, imparipinnate leaves (Chiovenda 1929: 152, tab. 16, fig. 1). Owing to its comparatively small flowers, apical dehiscence of the anthers and bifid standard it was placed by Chiovenda in a section of its own, Microcalpurnia Chiov. Calpurnia E. Mey. (Tribe Sophoreae) is a small genus of some seven species. Apart from C. uarandensis all but one species, C. aurea (Ait.) Benth., are restricted to South Africa. C. aurea is widespread in tropical and southern Africa with one subspecies also in southern India. This, subsp. indica Brummitt (1967), was given the rank of species by Yakovlev (1971). Brummitt (1967), in connection with his study of C. aurea, also examined the type of C. uarandensis and stated 'it is such a poor specimen that it cannot be identified with any certainty and it is most unlikely that it is a Calpurnia'. Yakovlev (1971) considered C. uarandensis as a totally enigmatic species. When visiting the Florence Herbarium in 1978 I had the opportunity to examine the type material of C. uarandensis and identified it as most probably a species of Dalbergia L. f. (Tribe Dalbergieae). However, only one species of this genus, D. commiphoroides Bak. f., was then known from Somalia and this is quite different from Calpurnia uarandensis. Instead, C. uarandensis, although clearly distinct, closely resembles D. microphylla Chiov., known from southern Ethiopia, Kenya and northern Tanzania. In February 1982 I collected in the outskirts of Mogadishu fruiting material of a Dalbergia resembling C. uarandensis. On a subsequent visit to the Kew Herbarium I found a flowering specimen of the same species, Popov 1009, also collected in Somalia and laid in as 'Dalbergia sp. probably new'. Mr J. B. Gillett also kindly informed me that he had made two collections of a Dalbergia which he believed to be D. microphylla from localities not far from Uarandi in Somalia. These collections have now also been seen by me. The present evidence clearly shows that Calpurnia uarandensis is a distinct species of Dalbergia, fairly widely distributed in the arid bushlands of central Somalia. The necessary new combination is made below and a description and an illustration of the species is given.

The Genus Cryptotaenia (Umbelliferae) in East Africa

A decision being made to commence work on the account of the Umbelliferae for the 'Flora of Tropical East Africa', it was decided to start with a few small and presumed straightforward genera in order to re-familiarise after some years' absence from serious work on the family. Among the genera chosen was Cryptotaenia, which promptly demonstrated the unwisdom of presumption. The African material of this genus, all determined in the Kew Herbarium as C. africana (Hook.f.) Drude on a 'routine-naming' basis by various botanists including myself, proved to sort readily into four elements. Three of these being new, they are described below.

Gigasiphon humblotianum (Leguminosae: Caesalpinioideae: Bauhinieae) as a Drift Seed

During a meeting of the Conchological Society of Great Britain and Ireland F. J. M. Pinn asked me if I could name various drift fruits and seeds he had discovered on the Kenya Coast at Msumarimi, 6-4 km N of Kikambala, whilst hunting for shells. I attempted to do this with only moderate success. One seed, obviously leguminous, was curious owing to the very characteristic crescentic funicular-lobe scars, restricted to the tribe Bauhineae and reaching a point of maximum development in the seed under notice, which proved to belong to the genus Gigasiphon (Baill.) Drake. I should have recognised the genus at once, having collected the very rare East African species, G. macrosiphon (Harms) Brenan, for the first time in Kenya and also having had to deal with the New Guinea species G. schlechteri (Harms) De Wit quite recently, (Plate 23 top and middle rows left, bottom row right.) My attempts to name the seed led me to the collection of drift seeds preserved in the Museum at Kew where indeed I did manage to match it with several seeds wrongly named 'Mucuna sp.' collected on the beaches of the Aldabra group of islands. It also matched a drawing in C. R. Gunn & I. V. Dennis's book on drift seeds (A World Guide to Tropical Drift Seeds and Fruits. New York, 1976, fig. 66/A-D), also incorrectly captioned Mucuna sp. Once it was evident that all these seeds belonged to Gigasiphon it became clear that they had to belong to G. humblotianum (Baill.) Drake, the Madagascan species of the genus of which only a photograph of the type was represented in the Kew Herbarium. Baillon described it in a short note entitled 'La plus longue fleur de la famille des Legumineuses' under the genus Bauhinia mentioning, however, that it deserved a section which he called Gigasiphon. He gave no locality but added 'sa gousse t later in the same bulletin he mentions the plant again giving the vague locality 'Humblot, Madag. bor.-or. absque loco (1880)'. Drake treated Gigasiphon as a genus also mentioning that Humblot has said 'gousse tres grande' and adding the same vague indication of locality 'r6gion Nord-Est'. Wondering about the present status of this plant I wrote to Prof. J.-F. Leroy at the Paris Herbarium and he kindly arranged for two more recent sheets to be sent to Kew on loan. One of these has a fruit with a portion removed to reveal one of the seeds. Unfortunately this material still does not absolutely confirm my conclusion since the seeds in the pod are small, only 2-3 cm wide; but despite the fact they are loose within the pod I feel certain that they are quite undeveloped particularly bearing in mind the great width of the pod. The other particulars fit well; G. humblotianum grows by the sea and there are ocean

A Problematic Transatlantic Disjunction in Paepalanthus (Eriocautaceae)

The monocotyledonous family Eriocaulaceae is extensively distributed, the most widespread genus, Eriocaulon, occurring in the Americas, Asia and Africa with one species in northwestern Europe. The genus Syngonanthus is also well represented in Africa and Central and South America. However, Paepalanthus, the largest genus of the family, is mainly restricted to the New World except for P. lamarckii Kunth, which is widespread in eastern and northern Brazil and sparingly so in tropical Africa, and P. pulvinatus N.E.Br., which has hitherto been considered to occur only in Africa. While studying Brazilian and African material of Paepalanthus in the Kew Herbarium (K), we noticed the striking similarity between P. pulvinatus (from Sierra Leone) and P. hispidissimus Herzog, a species from northeastern Brazil. Closer comparison of the two species has shown that they are synonymous. P. pulvinatus is well-defined by its habit, with densely-arranged glaucous, rosulate leaves (more than 200 per plant), which are pilose on the upper surface and glabrous below. Other distinctive characters of this species are the truncate sheath (spathe) with long terminal hairs and the inflorescence which, unusually for the genus, develops laterally rather than terminally. This species has hitherto only been known from the type specimen collected by Bockstatt, and in his monograph of the family, Ruhland (1903) mentions that though he did not examine the type, it appeared from the original description to be of doubtful affinity with, and very different from the other African members of the family. P. hispidissimus was characterized by Herzog by its very numerous, densely rosulate-caespitose leaves, and hitherto has only been known from the type material cited below. A careful comparison has shown that the two species are indistinguishable from one another in floral and vegetative characters.

Notes on Brillantaisia pubescens (Acanthaceae) with Particular Reference to Discontinuity in Flower Size

Summary. Two varieties are recognized in Brillantaisia pubescens, one having flowers approximately three times as big as the other. No correlation can be found with other characters, nor any geographical separation. The larger-flowered variety is described as var. riparia. Some discussion is given of possible causes of the floral dimorphism. The recent transfer of B. pubescens to Hygrophila is considered unjustified after study of pollen characters. Brillantaisia pubescens T. Anders. ex Oliv. is a rather distinctive member of the genus, easily recognized by its long spreading hairs on vegetative parts and its diffuse inflorescence with broadly obovate to almost orbicular bracts. It occurs from southeastern Tanzania to Zimbabwe, and in Madagascar. The species was described in 1875 by Oliver, based largely or wholly on a specimen collected by Speke & Grant in southern Tanzania. Since Oliver noted also 'The same species occurs in Zambesi-land', we designate the Speke & Grant specimen as lectotype rather than regard it as the holotype. No dimensions were given for the floral parts, but the description was accompanied by an illustration by W. H. Fitch. Judging from the specimen still in the Kew herbarium, Fitch seems to have used some artistic licence, adding leaves which are not on the specimen, and depicting very many more flowers than are actually present and showing them considerably larger than they are. Indeed, it might even be doubted whether the illustration was actually based on Speke & Grant's collection were it not for the fact that the original sketches for the illustration were made on the same sheet as the specimen and can still be clearly seen there. This illustration has apparently misled later authors, who have assumed that the original B. pubescens had considerably larger flowers than it actually has. Vatke in 1885 described a closely allied species, B. rutenbergiana, from Madagascar, differing only in the flowers being three times as small. In 1895 Lindau described a further species, B. anomala, from Mozambique, again distinguishing it from all other species by its smaller flowers. In the Flora of Tropical Africa, Burkill (1900) reduced B. anomala to synonymy of B. pubescens, clearly recognizing that his concept of the species included plants with large and small flowers but making no formal taxonomic separation between them. Later Benoist (1939), in his first account of the Acanthaceae of Madagascar, accepted Burkill's broad view of the species but recognized the small-flowered Madagascan material as a variety, var. rutenbergiana, based on Vatke's earlier species. We have re-examined the material in the Kew Herbarium, and find that on the basis of flower size it can be divided into two quite discrete groups with virtually no intermediates. We are unable, however, to find any other

Ceropegia distincta (Asclepiadaceae) and Some Related Species in Tropical East and Southern Africa

C. distincta was described by N. E. Brown in 1895 from a single collection made by Sir John Kirk in Zanzibar. In his account of the Asclepiadaceae in the Flora of Tropical Africa some eight years later, and since no further material had become available, Brown made the comment that the lobes of the flower were only seen in a bud and that the corona was damaged or incomplete. Werdermann (1939), when studying the East African species of Ceropegia, reported on the lack of a mature flower in the type specimen of this species and commented sceptically on the tubular coalescence of the corolla-lobes in a mature flower. He suspected that, while the narrow, stalk-like part of the corolla-lobes lie close together in the bud, they separate when the flower opens and only remain joined at the tips. He deduced this from a study of a specimen which he described as C. cyrtoidea, a new species closely related to C. distincta (see p. 000). The type specimen of C. distincta in the Kew Herbarium consists of two portions of stem with several detached leaves. The shorter portion of stem, which in its flattened and dried condition is up to 4 mm thick, bears a peduncle 25 mm long with one flower bud attached. The bud is curved, has an overall length of 20 mm and shows the characteristically abruptlynarrowed, stalk-like corolla-lobes with their expanded apices. The comparatively large calyx-lobes, 10-11 mm long, are evident both in the bud and on a separate inflorescence. This latter inflorescence consists of a peduncle 36 mm long bearing a single pedicel 14 mm long with a calyx but no corolla. Mutilated remnants of a corolla and a corona are present but in such a poor condition that no characters at all can usefully be distinguished. Amongst material examined in the Paris Herbarium, Werdermann discovered an undetermined specimen of Ceropegia from Zanzibar, Sacleux 326, which he identified as C. distincta and which is amply described. Huber (1958), in his revision of the genus, confirmed the identity of Sacleux 326 with Kirk's original collection and added two further Zanzibar collections: Vaughan 1177 and 1509 both in the Kew Herbarium. The first of these collections