II B RAR.Y OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS 58O.5 FB Return this book on or before the Latest Date stamped below A charge made on FLORA OF GUATEMALA PAUL C. STANDLEY AND JULIAN A. STEYERMARK FIELDIANA: BOTANY VOLUME 24, PART VI Published by CHICAGO NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM DECEMBER 27, 1949 FLORA OF GUATEMALA PART VI FLORA OF GUATEMALA PAUL C. STANDLEY Curator of the Herbarium AND JULIAN A. STEYERMARK Associate Curator of the Herbarium FIELDIANA: BOTANY VOLUME 24, PART VI Published by CHICAGO NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM DECEMBER 27, 1949 THL LIBRARY OF THE JAN 12 1950 Y OF i'i'NCIS PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BY CHICAGO NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM PRESS CONTENTS Families Included in Part VI PAGE Trigoniaceae 1 Vochysiaceae 2 Polygalaceae 5 Dichapetalaceae 22 Euphorbiaceae 25 Callitrichaceae 171 Buxaceae 172 Coriariaceae 174 Julianiaceae 175 Anacardiaceae 177 Cyrillaceae 195 Aquifoliaceae 196 Celastraceae 201 Hippocrateaceae 218 Staphyleaceae 223 Icacinaceae 225 Aceraceae 229 Hippocastanaceae 233 Sapindaceae 234 Sabiaceae 273 Impatientaceae 275 Rhamnaceae 277 Vitaceae 293 Tiliaceae 302 Malvaceae 324 Bombacaceae 386 Sterculiaceae 403 Saurauiaceae . . . 428 TRIGONIACEAE Reference: Paul C. Standley, Trigoniaceae, N. Amer. Fl. 25: 297- 298. 1924. Trees or shrubs, sometimes scandent; leaves opposite or alternate, simple, entire, penninerved; stipules usually present, large, interpetiolar, sometimes con- nate; flowers perfect, small, irregular, 2-bracteolate, racemose or paniculate; sepals 5, free or connate at the base, subequal, imbricate, deciduous; petals 3 or 5, white or pink, free, subperigynous, alternate with the sepals, unequal and somewhat papilionaceous, contorted in bud; stamens 5-12, with 2-6 of the fertile ones united, the tube cleft on one side; filaments filiform, the anthers 4-celled, oval, opening by longitudinal introrse slits; disk sometimes present; ovary free, 3-celled; style terminal, simple, the stigma capitate or obliquely truncate; ovules 2 or more in each cell, 2-seriate, attached to a central placenta, anatropous; fruit capsular, 3-celled, septicidally 3-valvate, the valves separating from the central column and themselves often separating into endocarp and epicarp; seeds 2 or more in each cell, the testa thin, covered with long wool; endosperm carnose, the embryo straight, the cotyledons plane, the radicle short. Three genera, one in the Malay Peninsula, the others in tropical America. Only one is represented in North America. TRIGONIA Aublet Usually woody vines; leaves opposite, short-petiolate, generally white- tomentose beneath; stipules simple or bifid at the apex, deciduous; flowers small, in terminal panicles or compound racemes; sepals connate at the base, unequal, the 2 inner ones larger; petals very unequal, the posterior one largest, calcarate or saccate, pilose in the throat of the spur, the blade reflexed, the 2 anterior ones ascending, narrow, barbate above the base, the other 2 petals smaller, approximate, keel-like; stamens 10 but usually only 6 of them fertile; 2-4 hypogynous glands or a crenate crest present opposite the posterior petal; ovary attenuate to the style, hirsute, the stigma obliquely truncate; ovules several or numerous; capsule trigonous, usually pubescent outside and often also within; seeds several in each cell, compressed-globose. About 30 species, in tropical America. Two other Central Ameri- can ones have been described from Nicaragua and Panama. Leaves mostly 4.5-8.5 cm. long, in age glabrous beneath or nearly so, with about 5 pairs of lateral nerves; capsule 2 cm. long or shorter; petioles 5 mm. long or shorter T. rasa. Leaves mostly 9-14 cm. long, usually abundantly pilose beneath even in age, with about 7 pairs of lateral nerves; capsule usually 2.5 cm. long; petioles mostly 7-13 mm. long T. floribunda. 2 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 Trigonia floribunda Oerst. Vid. Medd. 38. 1856. Moist or dry thickets on plains and foothills, chiefly on the Pacific slope, 850 meters or less; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Suchitepe"quez; Retalhuleu. Chiapas; Honduras and Salvador to Panama. A small or large, woody vine, the slender branches densely floccose-tomentose at first, soon glabrate; petioles 5-20 mm. long, mostly about 10 mm.; leaf blades elliptic-oblong to lance-oblong or obovate-oblong, 1.5-6 cm. wide, usually acute, obtuse or acute at the base, floccose-tomentose above when young but soon glabrate and green, covered beneath at first with a very dense, white tomentum, in age green but usually pilose, the lateral nerves 7-9 pairs; inflorescence thyrsoid- paniculate, much exceeding the leaves, 10-25 cm. long, the pedicels 1-2 mm. long; sepals lance-oblong, acute, 3-4 mm. long, tomentose outside; petals white, 3-4 mm. long, the spur globose, 2 mm. long; perfect stamens 6, glabrous, shorter than the petals; capsule obtusely trigonous, 2-3 cm. long, glabrate; seeds 6-9 in each cell, covered with long, whitish or fulvous, silky hairs. This is probably the plant reported from Guatemala by Hemsley as T. guianensis Aubl., on the basis of a collection made by Bernoulli and Cario. In T. floribunda the young leaves almost always are covered on the lower surface with a very dense, white tomentum, but on adult leaves scarcely a trace of the tomentum is to be seen. Trigonia rasa Standl. & Steyerm. Field Mus. Bot. 23: 59. 1944. Dry or moist, brushy plains or hillsides, 300 meters or some- what higher; Santa Rosa (type collected at Rio Panal, lower slopes of Volcan de Tecuamburro, along road between Cuilapa and Chi- quimulilla, Standley 78584); Retalhuleu (west of Retalhuleu); en- demic. A woody vine with elongate branched stems, the young ones hirtellous or puberulent; leaves subchartaceous, on petioles 2-5 mm. long, elliptic-oblong to oblong-ovate or ovate, mostly 4.5-8.5 cm. long and 2-3.5 cm. wide, narrowly long-acuminate, obtuse at the base, glabrous above or puberulent only on the costa, almost glabrous beneath in age, with a few scattered straight hairs on the costa and nerves, the lateral nerves about 5 pairs; inflorescences apparently small and 6 cm. long or less, the fruiting pedicels 7 mm. long or shorter; capsule oblong- ovoid, 1.5-2 cm. long, 1 cm. broad, sparsely pilose, densely covered with prominent pale lenticels. VOCHYSIACEAE References: Paul C. Standley, Vochyaceae, N. Amer. Fl. 25: 301- 303. 1924; F. A. Stafleu, A Monograph of the Vochysiaceae, Rec. Trav. Bot. Neer. 41: 398-540. 1948. Trees or shrubs, often with resinous sap, the branchlets terete or angulate; leaves opposite or verticillate, simple, entire, penninerved; stipules small, some- STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 3 times reduced to glands or absent; flowers perfect, irregular, large or small, bi- bracteolate, in racemes, panicles, or thyrses; sepals 5, connate at the base, im- bricate, subequal or very unequal, deciduous, one of them often calcarate or saccate; petals yellow, white, bluish, or purplish, free, perigynous or epigynous, rarely 5, subequal, and imbricate in bud, usually fewer than the sepals (0-3) and contorted or imbricate in bud; stamens inserted with the petals, typically 10 but only 1 of them fertile; filaments cylindric or filiform, the anthers linear to oval, 4-celled, dehiscent by 2 longitudinal introrse slits; ovary free or rarely inferior, 1-3-celled; style simple, terminal, the stigmas depressed-capitate, somewhat 3-lobate; ovules 2 or more in each cell, anatropous, attached to a central placenta; fruit usually capsular, loculicidally 3-valvate; seeds commonly winged, often pilose or lanate; endosperm none; embryo straight, the cotyledons thin, convolute, the radicle short, superior. Five genera, all except the following confined to South America. VOCHYSIA Jussieu Trees or shrubs; leaves opposite or verticillate, coriaceous, the stipules small or none; inflorescence terminal, thyrsoid, composed of racemosely arranged, 2-10- flowered, scorpioid, pedunculate cymes; sepals unequal, the posterior one large and usually produced into a spur; petals 3, rarely 1 or none, inserted in the throat of the calyx, linear or spatulate, the anterior one commonly largest; fertile stamen 1, the filament subulate or filiform, the anther basifixed, elongate, surpassed by the connective, this cucullate at the apex; staminodia 2 or none; ovary free, 3- celled, attenuate to a filiform style; capsule coriaceous or ligneous, 3-angulate, 3-celled; seeds 1 in each cell, oblong, compressed, winged. About 55 species, all except 4 in South America. One species is known in Central America from Costa Rica and Panama, and an- other occurs in Tabasco. The genus was first published by Aublet under the name Vochya. By Jussieu the name was published as Vochisia, but most authors have used the form Vochysia adopted here. Leaves acuminate or long-acuminate, broadest at or below the middle. V. guatemalensis. Leaves obtuse or rounded at the apex, usually broadest above the middle. V. hondurensis. Vochysia guatemalensis Bonn. Smith, Bot. Gaz. 12: 131. pi. 23. 1887. Vochya guatemalensis Standl. N. Amer. Fl. 25: 302. 1924. Ruanchap (Quecchi). Moist or wet forest, 350-1,500 meters; Alta Verapaz (type from Pansamala, Tuerckheim 943); Huehuetenango. Honduras; Mexico. A large tree, often 15 meters high or more, with pale bark, the branchlets glabrous; stipules subulate, 3 mm. long; leaves 3-4- verticillate or the uppermost opposite, on petioles 2-3 cm. long, oblong-lanceolate, 9-15 cm. long, 2.5-5.5 cm. wide, rather abruptly acuminate or long-acuminate, acute or acuminate at the 4 FIELD IANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 base, coriaceous, glabrous; flowers bright yellow, the thyrses terminal and axillary, forming large leafy panicles 10-18 cm. long, the rachis sparsely puberulent, the cymes 3-4-flowered; blade of the posterior sepal 15-20 mm. long, the spur half as long; petals oblong-obovate, the intermediate one half as long as the calyx and 4 mm. wide, the others slightly shorter and much narrower; anther glabrous, 10 mm. long. What was presumed to be this species was noted as in flower in April along river banks near San Pedro Carcha, where the branches were not accessible. Vochysia hondurensis Sprague, Kew Bull. 183. 1922. Vochya hondurensis Standl. N. Amer. Fl. 25: 303. 1924. San Juan; San- pedrano; Palo bayo (Pete"n); Sayuc (Pete*n, Maya); Robanchab (Alta Verapaz). Moist or wet forest, at or little above sea level; Pete"n; Izabal; Alta Verapaz. Oaxaca to British Honduras; Honduras; Nicaragua; Costa Rica. A tree 15-25 meters tall, the crown dense, rounded or depressed, the trunk tall and slender, much exceeding the crown, the bark smooth and grayish; branchlets glabrous; leaves 3-4-verticillate, on slender petioles 1-2.5 cm. long, oblong or oblanceolate-oblong, 8-15 cm. long, 2.5-5 cm. wide, rounded or obtuse at the apex and usually emarginate, acute or acuminate at the base, coriaceous, glabrous; flowers bright yellow, the thyrses terminal and axillary, 6-20 cm. long; blade of the posterior sepal 15 mm. long, the spur half as long; petals obovate, about 5 mm. long, ciliolate; anther glabrous, 6-10 mm. long; capsule narrowly oblong, deeply 3-sulcate, somewhat verrucose, acutely angulate, about 4.5 cm. long and 1.5 cm. broad. Known in British Honduras by the names "white mahogany," "yemeri," "emeri," and "emery"; called "corpus" and "corpo" in Oaxaca; known in Nicaragua as "barba chele." The tree is a con- spicuous and strikingly handsome one when covered with its brilliant yellow flowers. It is abundant in many places on the hills of the Quirigua region, as well as elsewhere in Izabal, where it often stands high above the surrounding trees. It is common about Puerto Barrios. The wood is reddish brown or pale brown with a pinkish hue and a golden sub-luster, although the surface may appear dull and mealy; light in weight, fairly tough, coarse-textured, inclined to be gritty and hard on tools when dry, holds its place well when manufactured; fairly resistant to decay and insects. The wood has been exported in small amounts from British Honduras to the United States for use as veneers. In the Lake Izabal region it is used in making canoes. In Oaxaca the tree is reported to attain a height of 27 meters or more and a trunk diameter of 60-100 cm. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 5 The wood is used there for railroad ties. It is questionable whether this species can be maintained as distinct from V. guatemalensis, to which it is very closely related, and separable by characters that appear to have slight importance, if any at all. Stafleu (loc. cit., p. 466) has recently described a var. parvifolia from British Honduras (El Cayo district, Gentle 2479), characterized by having smaller 3-verticillate leaves and smaller apiculate flower buds. POLYGALACEAE Reference: S. F. Blake, Polygalaceae, N. Amer. Fl. 25: 305-379. 1924. Herbs, shrubs, or trees, sometimes woody vines, often with glands in the tissues of the leaves and also in the flowers and fruits; leaves alternate,, opposite, or verticillate, simple, entire, short-petiolate, without stipules but sometimes with small stipular glands; flowers small or medium-sized, perfect, zygomorphic, gen- erally racemose or spicate, each subtended by a bract and 2 bractlets; sepals 5, free, or the lower 2 united, one posterior, 2 anterior, 2 lateral and interior, the last (wings) usually much larger and petaloid; petals 3, rarely 5, hypogynous, the anterior one (keel) boat-shaped, often with a terminal beak or fimbriate crest; stamens usually 8, rarely 3-7, the filaments united for most of their length into a sheath, this split on the upper side, usually united at the base to the keel or upper petals or both; anthers mostly confluently 1-celled, dehiscent by a sub- terminal pore; intrastaminal disk present or reduced to a gland at the base of the ovary, or wanting; gynoecium of 1-2, rarely 3-5, united carpels, the style 1, the stigma 2-lobate, often penicillate; ovules solitary, rarely 2-6, pendulous; fruit a capsule, drupe, or samara, loculicidally dehiscent or indehiscent; seeds usually solitary in each cell, generally pubescent, arillate, and with endosperm; embryo straight, axial. Ten genera with numerous species, widely distributed in tropical and temperate regions. Only the following are represented in North America. Ovary and fruit 2-celled; fruit a compressed capsule. Lower petals united with the keel; capsule usually broader than oblong; herbs or shrubs; leaves alternate or verticillate Poly gala. Lower petals free from the keel; capsule narrowly cuneate-oblong; usually woody vines, sometimes erect shrubs; leaves alternate Bredemeyera. Ovary and fruit 1-celled; fruit indehiscent, drupaceous or samaroid. Keel petal with a plicate crest; fruit a samara, with a large broad wing on the lower side; woody vines Securidaca. Keel petal not cristate; fruit drupaceous, not or very obscurely winged (in Central American species) ; erect shrubs or herbs Monnina. BREDEMEYERA Willdenow Mostly woody vines, sometimes suberect shrubs; leaves alternate, ovate or oblong, penninerved; flowers small, in terminal panicles; sepals unequal, the 2 6 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 inner ones large and petaloid, wing-like, the 2 lateral ones adnate at the base to the stamen tube, erect-connivent; keel petal about as long as the lateral ones, concave-galeate, entire or 3-lobate, ecristate; stamens 8, united below into a sheath; anthers dehiscent by an oblique introrse pore; ovary 2-celled, the style curved, stigmatose and emarginate at the apex; capsule compressed, subcarnose, cuneate- oblong, loculicidally dehiscent on the margins; seeds pendulous, glabrous or pilose, comose at the hilum with very long hairs; endosperm scant. About 60 species, in tropical America and Australia. Only one reaches North America. Bredemeyera lucida (Benth.) A. Bennett in Mart. Fl. Bras. 13, pt. 3: 51. 1874. Catocoma lucida Benth. in Hook. Journ. Bot. 4: 101. 1842. Moist or wet thickets or open forest, sometimes on open forested slopes or in second growth, 300 meters or less; Pete"n; Izabal. British Honduras; Honduras; northern South America. A shrub or a woody vine, when erect usually 2-4 meters high, when scandent as much as 12 meters long, the branches slender, puberulent; leaves short-petiolate, coriaceous, lustrous, elliptic to oblong, mostly 5-9 cm. long, acute or obtuse, with an obtuse tip, obtuse at the base, green and usually glabrous above, somewhat paler beneath, scaberulous or strigillose with lustrous golden hairs or often glabrate, the nerves and veins prominent and reticulate on both surfaces; panicles usually large and many-flowered, often much-branched, leafy, often densely flowered, the flowers greenish yellow, pedicellate, 3 mm. long; sepals broadly ovate or suborbicular, ciliate and pubescent; ovary pilose; fruit cuneate-oblong, 10-15 mm. long, shallowly emarginate, attenuate at the base, glabrous; seeds densely hirsute and comose with very long and slender hairs. MONNINA Ruiz & Pavon Herbs or shrubs, rarely somewhat scandent; leaves alternate, entire, estipulate or with stipular glands; flowers small, usually blue or lilac, in terminal and axillary, sometimes paniculate racemes; sepals 5, deciduous, the 3 outer ones herbaceous, free or the 2 lower ones united, the 2 inner ones (wings) much larger, petaloid; petals 3, the lower one (keel) boat-shaped, not unguiculate, not appendaged, free or nearly so; 2 upper petals usually oblong or liguliform, united below to the staminal sheath; stamens 8 or 6, the filaments united nearly to the apex into a sheath, the anthers confluently 1-celled, opening by a large introrse apical pore; ovary 1-celled, the style sickle-shaped, the stigma lobes dissimilar; ovules solitary, pendulous; disk usually reduced to a gland at the base of the ovary; fruit samaroid, narrowly and almost equally winged, or more often drupaceous, the surface rugose; seed glabrous, not arillate, the testa thin; endosperm thick. About 85 species, distributed from southwestern United States to Chile and Argentina, most numerous in the Andes of South America. Twelve are known in North America, and 6 besides those listed here are known from other parts of Central America. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 7 Racemes not at all comose, the bracts ovate, acute, 1.2-2.2 mm. long, not exceed- ing the buds; leaves usually 1-3 cm. wide and broadest above the apex. Pubescence of the stems closely appressed M. xalapensis. Racemes more or less comose toward the apex, the bracts mostly lanceolate and acuminate or attenuate, 2.5-7 mm. long, often conspicuously exceeding the buds; leaves mostly 3-6 cm. wide, broadest at or below the middle. Pubescence of the stems and leaves of short spreading hairs . . M. guatemalensis. Pubescence of the stems and leaves of closely appressed hairs M. sylvatica. Monnina guatemalensis Chodat, Bull. Herb. Boiss. 4: 249. 1896. Yaxtam (Huehuetenango). Moist or wet thickets, 1,000-1,700 meters; Alta Verapaz (type from Coban, Tuerckheim 8377); Baja Verapaz; Quiche"; Huehue- tenango. Chiapas. A slender shrub 1.5-2.5 meters high, with few branches, the stems densely short-pilose with spreading hairs; leaves short-petiolate, rather thick when dried and often lustrous, oval or elliptic, 6-11 cm. long, acute or acuminate, cuneate to rounded at the base, pilosulous with short spreading hairs on both surfaces, the lateral nerves 6-8 pairs; peduncles several near the ends of the branches, axillary and extra-axillary, the racemes mostly 5-15 cm. long; bracts lance-ovate, acuminate, 5-7 mm. long, the pedicels 1 mm. long, the flowers violet; sepals 3-3.8 mm. long; wing petals 4.5 mm. long; fruit ovoid, 7.5-8.5 mm. long, coarsely rugose-reticulate, glabrous, narrowly and obscurely marginate, at first red, glossy black at maturity. Monnina sylvatica Schlecht. & Cham. Linnaea 5: 231. 1830. Llordn de montana (Chiquimula). Moist or wet thickets or mixed forest, 900-2,400 meters; Baja Verapaz; Chiquimula; Suchitepe"quez; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Southern Mexico; Costa Rica. An herb or shrub 1-2.5 meters high with few branches, the stems thinly pubes- cent with short appressed hairs; leaves thin, short-petiolate, mostly elliptic or ovate-elliptic, 7-15 cm. long, 3-6.5 cm. wide, acuminate, cuneate at the base, sparsely strigillose on both surfaces, somewhat paler beneath; peduncles several or numerous, simple or branched, the racemes dense or interrupted, 18 cm. long or shorter, the flowers short-pedicellate, violet or orchid-purple; bracts lance- subulate, 4.5-5 mm. long, soon deciduous; sepals suborbicular-ovate to oval- ovate, 2-2.5 mm. long; wing petals 4-4.5 mm. long; fruit ovoid, 6-7 mm. long, coarsely rugose-reticulate, cristate on the upper margin and with a fluted wing 1 mm. wide on the lower margin. Monnina xalapensis HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 5: 414. 1823. San Benito; Tinta; Lap-chisquit (fide Aguilar); Tintilla; Zacate de venado; Tintamora. Wet to dry thickets and forest, often in oak, pine, or Cupressus forest, common in second growth, 1,200-3,500 meters, abundant in 8 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 many regions; Alta Verapaz; Zacapa; Jutiapa; Guatemala; Sacate- pe"quez; Chimaltenango; Solola; Quiche"; Totonicapan; Huehuete- nango; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Southern Mexico; Costa Rica; Panama. A shrub 1-3.5 meters high, often much-branched, the branches erect or strongly ascending, sparsely or densely strigillose; leaves thin, petiolate, oblanceolate or narrowly obovate, 4-8.5 cm. long, acuminate or acute, attenuate at the base, sparsely strigillose throughout, paler beneath; peduncles axillary and terminal, the racemes dense or interrupted, mostly 10 cm. long or shorter, the flowers violet or purple, short-pedicellate; bracts triangular-ovate, acute or obtuse, deciduous; sepals triangular-ovate or oblong-ovate, acute or obtuse, 2-3 mm. long; wings rounded-oval or oval, 5-6 mm. long; fruit ellipsoid-ovoid, rugose-reticulate, 6-8.5 mm. long, at first red, becoming purple or purplish black when ripe, very juicy. When loaded with ripe fruit, this is a conspicuous and rather handsome shrub, but the flowers are not conspicuous. Deer browse on the plant, and presumably it is eaten also by sheep and goats. In the Occidente the purple juice of the ripe fruit is sometimes used in place of ink. POLYGALA L. Reference: S. F. Blake, A revision of the genus Polygala in Mexico, Central America, and the West Indies, Contr. Gray Herb. 47: 1-122, pis. 1, 2. 1916. Herbs, shrubs, or trees; leaves alternate, or often opposite or verticillate, simple, entire, short-petiolate, very rarely with stipular glands; flowers mostly small and white, pink, or purple, in terminal or axillary, rarely extra-axillary racemes, rarely umbellate; sepals 5, the 3 outer ones herbaceous, free or the lower 2 connate, deciduous or persistent, the 2 inner ones (wings) petaloid or rarely subherbaceous, usually much larger than the others; petals normally 3, united at the base, the lowest (keel) boat-shaped, unguiculate, sometimes 3-lobate, un- appendaged or usually with an apical beak or crest; 2 upper petals ligulate to ovate, sometimes galeate; stamens 8, rarely 6, the filaments united almost to the apex, the anthers usually confluently 1-celled, opening by an apical pore; ovary 2-celled, the ovules solitary, pendulous from the apex of the central placenta; style usually slender, bent, more or less excavate at the apex, the stigma 2-lobate; capsule equally or unequally 2-celled, often winged or marginate, compressed contrary to the partition, loculicidally dehiscent; seeds globose to fusiform or conic, usually pubescent, almost always arillate, with or without endosperm, the testa crustaceous. Species 500 or more, widely distributed in temperate and tropical regions. About 180 are known from North America. A very few besides those listed here are found in southern Central America. Keel petal obtuse, without a crest or beak. Calyx with all its sepals free. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 9 Wing sepals very small, about one-third longer than the outer sepals; capsule subcoriaceous, thick-walled. Erect shrub with somewhat coriaceous leaves and yellowish flowers P. jamaicensis. Wing sepals much larger than the outer sepals; capsule membranaceous- herbaceous, thin-walled. Lower sepals petaloid, the upper sepal herbaceous, persistent; capsule about 3 mm. long; aril of the seed glabrous P. Purpusii. Lower sepals herbaceous, like the others, all deciduous; capsule usually much larger; aril pubescent, at least at the apex. Wings rounded-oval or broadly oval, usually less than twice as long as wide P. consobrina. Wings oblong, oblong-oval, or oblong-obovate, from almost twice to 4 times as long as wide. Wings 7-10 mm. long P. costaricensis. Wings 6.5 mm. long or shorter. Wings glabrous P. polymorpha. Wings pubescent dorsally. Wings sparsely long-pilose dorsally; leaves lance-elliptic to linear. P. trichoplera. Wings incurved-puberulent along the costa and toward the apex; leaves ovate or lance-ovate. Seed glabrous P. guatemalensis. Seed pubescent P. Durandi. Calyx with the 2 lower sepals connate. Plants annual P. bryzoides. Plants perennial, often woody. Flowers green P. hondurana. Flowers purple or violet. Branches of the inflorescence subtomentose P. Securidaca. Branches of the inflorescence puberulent or strigose P. floribunda. Keel petal with a beak or crest at the apex. Capsule winged or marginate on the upper cell, marginless on the lower cell. Capsule strongly transverse-rugose or transverse- veined P. rhysocarpa. Capsule smooth, not transverse-rugose P. Salviniana. Capsule marginless, or narrowly and equally marginate on both cells. Leaves all or most of them verticillate. Racemes subglobose, as broad as long P. conferta. Racemes much longer than broad. Capsule 1.5 mm. long P. asperuloides. Capsule 2-2.5 mm. long P. aparinoides. Leaves not verticillate except rarely a few whorls on the lowest part of the stem. Racemes slender and much elongate, mostly 5 mm. broad or less, tapering at the apex. Stems glabrous. Plants perennial, usually with several stems P. alba. Plants annual, the stems solitary. Seed glabrous; flowers white, densely crowded in the racemes. P. gracillima. Seed pubescent; flowers purple or white, the racemes rather lax. P. leptocaulis. Stems glandular-puberulent. 10 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 Capsule more than 3 mm. long; flowers white P. Berlandieri. Capsule 1.5-1.7 mm. long; flowers purple or white. Seed appressed-pubescent, the hairs not glochidiate; aril well de- veloped P. paniculata. Seed covered with incurved uncinate-tipped hairs; aril obsolete. P. glochidiata. Racemes mostly short and broad, generally about as broad as long, usually not at all tapering at the apex, rarely more elongate but then 8-10 mm. thick. Stems with several whorls of leaves below; racemes very dense and many- flowered, mostly more than twice as long as broad. .P. hygrophila. Stems with a single whorl of leaves at the very base, or all the leaves usually alternate. Wings conspicuously cuspidate at the apex P. longicaulis. Wings rounded or merely apiculate at the apex. Wings 4.7-5.3 mm. long; aril minute P. adenophora. Wings 2.7-3.6 mm. long; aril 0.5-1.3 mm. long P. variabilis. Polygala adenophora DC. Prodr. 1: 327. 1824. Wet open pine forest, at or little above sea level; British Hon- duras. Trinidad and northern South America (Guianas). A very slender, erect annual 15-35 cm. high, simple or branched above, glabrous, sometimes papillose below; leaves alternate, linear, 4-16 mm. long, erect or ascending; racemes solitary at the ends of the peduncles, obtuse, 7-12 mm. broad, 1-4 cm. long, most often about as long as broad; bracts ovate, decidu- ous, the pedicels 1 mm. long, the flowers purple or rarely white; sepals oval or ovate, apiculate or obtuse, 1.3-2 mm. long; wings narrowly elliptic, about 5 mm. long, obscurely apiculate or obtuse; keel with a lobate crest near the apex; capsule narrowly elliptic, 3.5 mm. long, 1-1.3 mm. wide; seed obconic, pilose, comose at the apex, 1.8-2 mm. long, the aril minute. Polygala alba Nutt. Gen. PI. 2: 87. 1818. Moist or wet, open places, 300-1,000 meters; Huehuetenango (Cie"naga de Lagartero; between Nenton and Las Palmas). Western United States; Mexico. Stems slender, erect, usually numerous from a perennial root, simple or sparsely branched, usually 15-35 cm. high, glabrous; leaves scattered except for 1-2 verticels at the base of the stem, the lowest spatulate-obovate and 4-12 mm. long, the others linear, cuspidate-acuminate, 8-25 mm. long; racemes dense, conic-cylindric, about 5 mm. thick, 2-8 cm. long; flowers white or sometimes tinged with purple; sepals ovate to oblong, obtuse, 1.3-1.5 mm. long, the wings elliptic, almost 3 mm. long; keel 3 mm. long, the crest of 4 lobes on each side; capsule elliptic or oblong-elliptic, 2.5-2.9 mm. long; seed pilose, 2.3-2.5 mm. long, the aril 0.8-1.5 mm. high, its 2 lobes oblong, appressed. The seeds of the Guatemalan specimens are more spreading- pilose than is typical of the species. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 11 Polygala aparinoides Hook. & Arn. Bot. Beechey Voy. 227. 1836. P. nemoralis A. W. Benn. Journ. Bot. 17: 172. 1879, in part (type from Chilasco, Baja Verapaz, Salvin & Godmari). P. Vogtii Chodat, Me"m. Soc. Phys. Geneve 31(2), pt. 2: 144. 1893 (based in part on material from Coban, Alta Verapaz, Tuerckheim 136). Ipecacuana blanca; Peor es nada (Huehuetenango). Moist or wet forest or thickets, sometimes in pine forest, occa- sionally in marshes, 2,600 meters or lower; Alta Verapaz; Baja Verapaz; El Progreso; Izabal; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Santa Rosa; Quiche". Central and southern Mexico. Stems slender, solitary or several from a slender perennial base, erect or spread- ing, often 40 cm. long or more; leaves 5-verticillate throughout or the uppermost scattered, lanceolate or the lowest broader, 1-2 cm. long, 5-10 mm. wide, acute or subacute, cuspidate, acute at the base, sessile or nearly so, the margins obscurely denticulate; racemes cylindric, tapering at the apex, rather dense, 5-6 mm. thick, 16 cm. long or usually much shorter, the pedicels less than 1 mm. long; flowers purplish or reddish mixed with green; sepals broadly oval or ovate, glandular- ciliate, 1.5-1.8 mm. long; wings elliptic-obovate, 2-3.5 mm. long, rounded; keel cristate at the apex; capsule broadly elliptic, 2-2.5 mm. long; seed appressed- pilose, equaled by the 2 narrowly oblong, appressed lobes of the aril. This has been reported from Guatemala as P. verticillata L., P. Boykinii Nutt., and P. galioides Poir. Polygala asperuloides HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 5: 403. 1823. At or little above sea level; Izabal (near Izabal, Sereno Watson 19). British Honduras; Panama; Colombia. Stems 1-several from an annual root, erect or ascending, 10-30 cm. long; leaves all 5-verticillate or the uppermost in 2's or 3's, the lowest ones rounded- obovate, 7-9 mm. long, 4.5-5 mm. wide, the middle and upper ones lanceolate or lance-elliptic, 1-2 cm. long, cuspidate, with obscurely denticulate margins; flowers pink, the racemes 3-5 mm. thick, 1-5 cm. long, the pedicels 0.4 mm. long; sepals rounded-ovate to oblong, 1 mm. long or less; wings broadly elliptic, 1.5 mm. long; keel cristate at the apex; capsule suborbicular, 1.5 mm. long; seed appressed- pilose, 1.5 mm. long, the aril 1 mm. long, with 2 oblong appressed lobes. Polygala Berlandieri Wats. Proc. Amer. Acad. 21: 416. 1886. Grassy hillsides or a weed in cultivated ground, 1,200-2,300 meters; Santa Rosa; Guatemala. Mexico; Salvador. A slender erect annual, often much-branched, 5-15 cm. high, densely stipitate- glandular; lowest leaves 4-5-verticillate, most of the leaves scattered and linear, 5-20 mm. long, acute, cuspidate; racemes cylindric, rather lax, 5 cm. long or shorter, the pedicels 0.8 mm. long; flowers usually white, the sepals rounded-ovate or ovate- oblong, subacute or obtuse, 1.2 mm. long; wings spatulate-obovate, 2.3 mm. long, rounded at the apex; keel cristate at the apex; capsule narrowly elliptic, 3.3 mm. long or slightly shorter; seed 2.5 mm. long, sericeous, the aril 0.5 mm. long, 2-lobate. 12 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 Polygala bryzoides St. Hil. Fl. Bras. Merid. 2: 44. 1829. P. an- gustifolia HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 5: 405. 1823, not P. angustifolia Gilib. 1781. Moist or dry, rocky and open or grassy slopes, sometimes on sandbars along streams or in pine forest, 1,500 meters or less; Pete"n; Alta Verapaz; Baja Verapaz; Izabal; Zacapa; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Suchitepe"quez ; Retalhuleu ; Huehuetenango. Mexico ; Honduras and Salvador to Panama; West Indies; southward to Brazil. Plants annual, simple or branched, 10-30 cm. high, very slender, pubescent throughout with short, straight or incurved and more or less appressed hairs; leaves alternate, linear or lanceolate, 1.5-4.5 cm. long, 2-9 mm. wide, acute or acuminate at each end, 1-nerved, often almost glabrous; flowers pinkish purple and greenish, the racemes terminal and axillary, 1.5-5 cm. long, the pedicels mostly recurved, more than 1 mm. long; sepals oblong-ovate, obtuse, sparsely ciliate at the apex, with 2-3 pairs of pedicellate glands, 1.5-1.8 mm. long; wings broadly cuneate-obovate, retuse, 3-4 mm. long; capsule oblong-oval, 3 mm. long; seed 2.5 mm. long, the aril 0.7 mm. long. Polygala conferta A. W. Benn. ex Hemsl. Diag. PL Nov. 2. 1878. Open pine forest, 1,000-1,200 meters; Huehuetenango; reported by Blake as collected in Guatemala, "Barranca de Fuerengo," Bernoulli 105; the locality name is incorrectly transcribed, and we are unable to guess what it may be. Central and southern Mexico. A slender erect annual, simple or sparsely branched, 7-14 cm. high, glabrous; lowest leaves 5-verticillate, spatulate-obovate, 3.5-7.5 mm. long, the middle leaves linear, 7-13 mm. long, acuminate, mucronate; racemes headlike, dense and many- flowered, 6 mm. broad, the pedicels 1.2-1.5 mm. long; flowers pinkish or greenish white, the sepals rounded-ovate or ovate, obtuse or subacute, 1 mm. long; wings oval, 1.8 mm. long; keel cristate; capsule rounded-oval, 1.3 mm. long; seed pubes- cent, 1 mm. long, the aril 0.7 mm. high, with 2 oblong appressed lobes. Polygala consobrina Blake, Contr. Gray Herb. 47: 48. 1916. P. Hayesii Blake, loc. cit. (type collected near Guatemala, Sutton Hayes in 1860). Hierba del rosario; Ipecacuana; Calzdn de nino. Moist slopes, fields, or thickets, 150-2,000 meters; Chiquimula; Santa Rosa; Escuintla (type from Escuintla, J. D. Smith 1980); Guatemala; Chimaltenango. Salvador. Perennial from a rather thick, woody root, the stems usually several, erect or ascending, 10-30 cm. high, densely puberulent with mostly incurved hairs; lower leaves oval, obtuse, the middle and upper ones alternate, ovate, 2-5 cm. long, acute, broadly cuneate at the base, reticulate- veined, puberulent; racemes dense and many-flowered, mostly 5 cm. long or shorter, the flowers violet or greenish violet; sepals lanceolate, acuminate, 3 mm. long; wings oblong-oval, STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 13 4.5-5.5 mm. long, 2.5 mm. wide, rounded at the apex, ciliolate, pilosulous on the outer surface; capsule oval, densely ciliate and pilosulous, 9 mm. long; seed 6 mm. long, the aril 2.3-3.8 mm. high, pilose. This has been reported from Guatemala as P. americana Mill, and P. hebantha Benth. The species of this group, formerly passing as P. americana, have been multiplied beyond reason, upon characters that apparently are variable and obscure. It is probable that at least half, and still better two-thirds, of the recently proposed ones should be reduced to synonymy. Polygala costaricensis Chodat, Bull. Soc. Bot. Belg. 30, pt. 1: 298. 1891. ?P. guatemalensis Gandog. Bull. Soc. Bot. France 60: 454. 1913, not P. guatemalensis A. W. Benn. 1895. P. platycarpa var. stricta Chodat, Me"m. Soc. Phys. Geneve 31(2), pt. 2: 27. 1893 (type collected between Rabinal and Santa Ana, Baja Verapaz, Bernoulli 1092). P, isotricha Blake, Contr. Gray Herb. 47: 53. 1916. Ipecacuana amarilla (fide Aguilar). Moist or wet thickets or forest, often in pine-oak forest, or in rather dry, exposed, rocky places, sometimes a weed in coffee planta- tions, 150-2,100 meters; Alta Verapaz; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Guatemala; Sacatepe"quez; Chimaltenango; Quich^ ; Suchitepe"quez ; Quezaltenango. Chiapas; Costa Rica. Perennial from a woody root, sometimes suffrutescent at the base, the stems solitary or several, simple or branched, erect to procumbent, sometimes 75 cm. long but usually much shorter, puberulent and sometimes short-pilose; leaves short-petiolate, thin, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, 2.5-6.5 cm. long, acute or acumi- nate, obtuse or cuneate at the base, reticulate-veined, rather sparsely puberulent and sometimes short-pilose; racemes lax or rather dense, 3-12 cm. long, the flowers purple or violet, short-pedicellate; sepals lanceolate, acuminate, 2.5-3 mm. long; wings oblong to oblong-oval, 8-10 mm. long, sparsely puberulent along the costa and at the apex; capsule oval, ciliate, puberulent, about 10 mm. long; seed short-pilose, the aril 2.7 mm. high. This has been reported from Guatemala as P. americana Mill. Polygala Durandi Chodat, Bull. Soc. Bot. Belg. 30, pt. 1: 300. 1891. Sopladorcito; Hoja de aire. Open or shaded banks, moist thickets, or open oak forest, 200- 2,100 meters; El Progreso; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Escuintla; Guatemala; Chimaltenango; Solola; Hue- huetenango. Costa Rica. Perennial from a woody root, the stems solitary or several, erect or ascending, 50 cm. long or less, simple or branched, densely pubescent with short hairs; leaves short-petiolate, alternate, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, 2-5 cm. long, acute or acumi- 14 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 nate, or the lowest oval and obtuse, cuneate or obtuse at the base, thin, reticulate- veined, sparsely or often densely pubescent; racemes mostly 4-5 cm. long, dense or lax, many-flowered, the flowers violet or purple, short-pedicellate; sepals lanceo- late, acute, 2-2.8 mm. long; wings oblong, 6 mm. long, rounded at the apex, sparsely ciliate, puberulent along the costa and near the apex; capsule oval, pubes- cent, 1 cm. long; seed 5 mm. long, pilose, the aril 3 mm. high. This and related species are used in medicine in Guatemala, at least in household remedies. The roots of some American species of Poly gala are used like ipecac (Cephaelis Ipecacuanha}. Polygala floribunda Benth. PI. Hartweg. 58. 1840. P. sphae- rospora Chodat, Bot. Jahrb. 52, Beibl. 115: 75. 1914 (type collected above San Jeronimo, Baja Verapaz, Seler 3393). Chupac, Chopac, Raxjuc (Alta Verapaz, Quecchi). Moist or wet thickets or forest, often in pine forest, sometimes in second growth, 1,000-1,800 meters; Alta Verapaz; Baja Verapaz; Zacapa; Jalapa; Santa Rosa; Guatemala; Quiche"; Huehuetenango. Chiapas and perhaps elsewhere in southern Mexico. An erect shrub 1-3 meters high, or often a large woody vine, sparsely pubescent or puberulent or usually almost glabrous; leaves short-petiolate, rather thick and firm, rather conspicuously reticulate-veined, ovate or lanceolate, 4-10 cm. long, acute or acuminate, mucronate, obtuse or cuneate at the base, paler beneath; racemes lax, many-flowered, mostly 10-20 cm. long, axillary and terminal, often very numerous, the pedicels 8-13 mm. long; flowers bright purple; sepals sub- equal, obtuse, oval, ciliate, 4 mm. long; wings suborbicular, 8-11 mm. long or in fruit somewhat larger, venose, ciliate; capsule transversely broad-oblong and obcordate, stipitate, ciliate and pubescent, about 8 mm. long and 10 mm. wide; seed globose, tomentose, 3 mm. thick, the aril 2 mm. high. A common and showy plant of the Coban region, often occurring in great abundance, especially in thickets and rather open pine forest. It is an exceptionally beautiful plant because of its brilliantly colored flowers, and it is much planted for ornament, not only in Coban but in other parts of Guatemala. The shrub is usually erect in cultivation, but in the woods it usually is a small or medium-sized vine. In North American Flora it is stated that the species of Polygala are never scandent, but this one is decidedly so. In Alta Verapaz the roots are used as a substitute for soap, giving abundant suds when macerated in water. They are used particularly for removing dandruff, and for treating eczema and other cutaneous diseases. The roots also are chewed to cleanse the teeth and harden the gums. Polygala glochidiata HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 5: 400. 1823. Moist fields, brushy slopes, oak-pine forest, 800-1,900 meters, or sometimes at even lower elevations; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Saca- STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 15 tepe"quez; Huehuetenango. Mexico; British Honduras; Honduras; Costa Rica; Cuba; South America. A very slender annual 30 cm. high or less, often much-branched, finely stipitate- glandular; lower leaves 5-verticillate, the lowest lance-obovate, 3-4.5 mm. long, the middle and upper leaves linear, 5-12 mm. long, cuspidate; racemes cylindric, rather lax, 5-6 mm. thick, 1-8 cm. long; flowers short-pedicellate, rose-purple, rarely white; sepals elliptic or oblong, obtuse, 1 mm. long; wings obovate-oval, 2.5 mm. long, rounded at the apex; keel cristate at the apex; capsule elliptic, 1.5 mm. long; seed 1 mm. long, covered with incurved uncinate-tipped hairs, these spreading when wet; aril obsolete. Polygala gracillima Wats. Proc. Amer. Acad. 22: 398. 1887. Open places in pine-oak forest, 1,200-2,400 meters; Baja Verapaz; Chiquimula; Quiche"; Huehuetenango. Mexico. A very slender, erect, glabrous annual, 10-20 cm. high, usually much-branched above; lowest leaves ternate, obovate, 3-3.5 mm. long, the others scattered, linear, 2-7 mm. long; racemes dense, many-flowered, tapering at the apex, 6-25 mm. long, 2.5 mm. thick; flowers short-pedicellate, white, the bracts persistent, lance- subulate; sepals ovate or oval, 0.6 mm. long; wings oblong-oval, 1.3 mm. long; keel cristate at the apex; capsule suborbicular, 1 mm. long; seed black, glabrous, ellipsoid-fusiform, striate, 0.5 mm. long, the aril minute. Polygala guatemalensis A. W. Benn. Journ. Bot. 33: 108. 1895. Known only from the type, Coban, Alta Verapaz, 1,340 meters, Tuerckheim 298 (in part). Perennial, suffrutescent, 50 cm. high, with few erect branches, rather densely and finely pubescent; leaves alternate, short-petiolate, ovate, 2.5-4 cm. long, acuminate, reticulate-veined, sparsely pubescent on both surfaces; racemes rather dense, 4.5-9.5 cm. long; sepals lanceolate, acute, 3 mm. long; wings oblong, 5-6 mm. long, rounded at the apex, puberulent along the costa and near the apex; immature capsule oval, pilosulous, 8 mm. long; seed glabrous, 2.2 mm. long, the aril 1 mm. high. Polygala hondurana Chodat, Bot. Jahrb. 52, Beibl. 115: 75. 1914. P. tonsa Blake, Contr. Gray Herb. 47: 63. 1916 (type from La Vega, Santa Rosa, Heyde & Lux 3067). Moist or usually wet thickets or forest, 600-1,800 meters; Alta Verapaz; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Huehuetenango. Honduras; Salvador; Nicaragua. Perennial from a rather thick, nodose root, erect, a meter high or less, usually frutescent, often with numerous, erect or ascending, slender, green branches, sparsely puberulent or glabrate; leaves short-petiolate, alternate, thin, ovate to lanceolate, 5-10 cm. long, long-acuminate, usually rounded or obtuse at the base, 16 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 deep green above, paler beneath; racemes lax, few-flowered, mostly shorter than the leaves, the bracts caducous, the pedicels slender, 4-8 mm. long; flowers pale green; sepals ciliate, puberulent, 3 mm. long; wings ovate-orbicular, 8-9 mm. long, venose, glabrous; capsule quadrate-orbicular, deeply emarginate, 6-7 mm. long and equally wide; seed tomentose, 4.8 mm. long, the aril 2 mm. high. This species is easily recognized by its shrubby habit and large pale green flowers. The name "hierba del rosario" is applied to this species in Salvador. It has been reported from Guatemala as P. monninoides HBK. Polygala hygrophila HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 5: 395. pi. 508. 1823. Savannas or grassy pine forest, at or little above sea level; British Honduras. Chiapas; Panama; northern South America. A slender erect annual, 35 cm. high or less, simple or with a few erect branches, glabrous; lowest leaves verti ciliate, the upper ones scattered, linear or lance- linear, 13-18 mm. long; racemes cylindric-ovoid, slightly comose at the apex, about 2 cm. long and 8 mm. thick; sepals oval, 1.8 mm. long; wings oval, 4.5 mm. long, rounded at the apex, green tinged with pale red or deep pink; keel cristate; capsule subglobose, turgid; seed ellipsoid, 1.7 mm. long, pubescent, the aril 1 mm. long. This has been reported from British Honduras as P. Timoutou Aubl., a South American species, with much broader leaves, extend- ing northward into Panama. Polygala jamaicensis Chodat, Me"m. Soc. Phys. Geneve 31(2), pt. 2: 11. 1893. P. petenensis Lundell, Lloydia 4: 51. 1941 (type from Sabana Zis, northwestern end of Lago de Pete"n, C. L. Lundell 3187). Limonaria cimarrona. In forest, 800 meters or less; Pete"n (Camp 36, Guatemalan boundary). British Honduras; Jamaica. A shrub or small tree, in Guatemala 1-3 meters high, much-branched, woody throughout, the branches densely puberulent or finally glabrate; leaves short- petiolate, ovate to ovate-lanceolate, 3.5-8.5 cm. long, obtuse to acuminate, cuneate at the base, sparsely and minutely strigillose; peduncles 1-1.5 mm. long, the axis of the raceme 3-6 mm. long, the pedicels 2-5 mm. long, puberulent, the flowers few, yellow; sepals rounded-ovate or deltoid-ovate, 1.5 mm. long; wings deltoid- ovate, 2 mm. long; keel 4 mm. long; capsule subquadrate, lobate one-fifth its length, with rounded lobes, ciliate and pubescent, 7-11 mm. wide, stipitate; seed 6 mm. long, the aril 3 mm. high. After comparing the two known collections of P. petenensis with numerous Jamaican collections of P. jamaicensis, we are unable to find any characters by which they can be distinguished. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 17 Polygala leptocaulis Torr. & Gray, Fl. N. Amer. 1: 130. 1838. P. Pringlei Wats. Proc. Amer. Acad. 25: 142. 1890. Tamiz. Open, grassy, moist or wet plains, often in marshes or in oak forest, 2,000 meters or less; Izabal; Jalapa; Jutiapa; Quiche"; Huehue- tenango. Southern United States; Mexico; British Honduras; Hon- duras; Salvador; Cuba; South America. A very slender, erect annual, 50 cm. high or less, glabrous, simple or sparsely branched; leaves alternate, linear, 8-25 mm. long; racemes cylindric, lax or dense, 13 cm. long or less, about 5 mm. thick; flowers lilac or greenish pink, short-pedicel- late; sepals ovate, obtuse, 1 mm. long; wings obovate, 2 mm. long, rounded at the apex; keel cristate; capsule oblong, 1.6-1.8 mm. long; seed subcylindric, ap- pressed-pubescent, 1.2 mm. long, the aril minute, 2-lobate. This has sometimes been confused with P. paludosa St. Hil. Polygala longicaulis HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 5: 396. 1823. Cambray (Huehuetenango). Moist savannas or pine forest, sometimes in dry rocky open places, 1,400 meters or less; Pete"n; Izabal; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Quiche"; Huehuetenango. Central and southern Mexico; British Honduras to Panama; West Indies; South America. A slender erect annual, 45 cm. high or less, glabrous, simple or branched above; leaves alternate, linear, 4-16 mm. long, erect or ascending; racemes very obtuse, dense, 7-12 mm. broad, usually little longer than broad but sometimes almost 5 cm. long; bracts ovate, deciduous, the pedicels 1 mm. long; flowers rose-purple; sepals oval or ovate, apiculate or obtuse, 1.5-2 mm. long; wings narrowly elliptic, about 5 mm. long, obscurely apiculate or obtuse; keel cristate; capsule narrowly elliptic, 3.5 mm. long; seed obconic, pilose, comose at the apex, 2 mm. long, the aril minute. This has been reported from Guatemala as P. trichosperma Torr. Polygala paniculata L. PI. Jam. Pugill. 18. 1759. P. paniculata f. leucoptera Blake, ( Contr. Gray Herb. 47: 101. 1916. Lanillo; Ipecacuana; Rax cukichoj (Coban, Quecchi); Mentol; Menta. Moist fields, banks, or thickets, on sandbars along streams, often a weed in cultivated or waste ground, sometimes in open, oak or pine forest, 2,000 meters or less, most frequent at low elevations; Alta Verapaz; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Escuintla; Guatemala; Sacatepe"quez ; Suchitepe"quez ; Retalhuleu; Quiche" ; Huehuetenango; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Texas; southern Mexico; British Honduras to Salvador and Panama; West Indies; South America. 18 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 A slender erect annual 10-30 cm. high, often much-branched, densely stipitate- glandular; lowest leaves verticillate, the others alternate, linear, 8-18 mm. long; racemes lax, cylindric, 5-6 mm. thick, 9 cm. long or less, the flowers short-pedicel- late, purplish, pink, or white; sepals ovate or oblong-ovate, obtuse, 1.3 mm. long; wings obovate or spatulate-obovate, 2-2.5 mm. long, rounded at the apex; keel cristate; capsule elliptic, 1.7 mm. long; seeds appressed-pubescent, 1.5 mm. long, the aril 0.4-0.8 mm. long, the 2 lobes appressed. Called "hierba del colico" in Salvador, where the plant is used in domestic medicine. The Guatemalan names "menta" and "mentol" allude to the fact that the roots, when chewed, have a mint-like taste. The same flavor is found in the roots of Polygala species of the southern United States, as is well known to children living where the plants are found. This is by far the commonest Polygala of Central America, being an unattractive weedy plant, often common about dwellings and in waste ground generally. Polygala polymorpha Chodat, Bot. Jahrb. 52, Beibl. 115: 74. 1914. Usually on dry limestone hillsides, sometimes a weed in cornfields, 900-2,600 meters; endemic; Huehuetenango (type from Chacula, Seler 3130). Perennial from a somewhat ligneous root, the stems few or numerous, erect or decumbent, 10-20 cm. long, strigillose; leaves short-petiolate, alternate, ovate- elliptic to narrowly lance-oblong, 2-3.5 cm. long, obtuse or acute, thick, mucronate, sparsely and minutely strigillose; racemes lax, terminal, few-flowered; flowers purple, 6-7 mm. long; sepals lance-linear, acute; wings oblong-elliptic, glabrous; capsule oblong, 9 mm. long, cuneate at the base, pilosulous; seed hirsute, the aril 3-lobate. Polygala Purpusii Brandeg. Univ. Calif. Publ. Bot. 4: 88. 1910. Dry, open, often rocky slopes, 1,200-1,600 meters; Huehue- tenango (region of Cuilco). Puebla, Mexico. An erect perennial as much as 50 cm. high, herbaceous or suffrutescent below, the perpendicular root rather thick and lignescent, the stems few or numerous, simple or sparsely branched, incurved-pilosulous, terete; leaves on short slender petioles, oval to oblong-oval, 9-18 mm. long, 4-11 mm. wide, rounded or very obtuse at the apex, acute at the base, incurved-puberulent, usually rather densely so, especially beneath; racemes terminal, sessile or short-pedunculate, 12 cm. long or shorter, laxly many-flowered, the flowers lavender, slender-pedicellate, the pedicels recurved in age; bracts rather conspicuous, narrowly lanceolate; upper sepal herbaceous, persistent and conspicuous in fruit, 3 mm. long or less; lower sepals petaloid, oblong-obovate, deciduous, not unguiculate, 3.5 mm. long; wings obovate-oval, 4-4.7 mm. long; keel whitish, with a yellowish tip; capsule sub- orbicular, incurved-puberulent toward the apex, 3 mm. long; seed obovoid, pilose, 2.5 mm. long; aril glabrous, 2-lobate. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 19 Polygala rhysocarpa Blake, N. Amer. Fl. 25: 366. 1924. Dry rocky mountain slopes, 2,800-3,500 meters; Huehuetenango (below Calaveras, Sierra de los Cuchumatanes, Steyermark 50347). Veracruz, Mexico. Stems few or several from a very slender, annual root, 25 cm. high or less, erect or nearly so, simple or sparsely branched, puberulent with spreading gland- like hairs; lowest leaves obovate, 3-5 mm. long, puberulent, the other leaves alter- nate, oblanceolate or linear, 4-15 mm. long, acuminate at each end, puberulent; racemes cylindric, acute or acuminate, dense above, lax below, 3-5 mm. thick, 1.5-7 cm. long; bracts lance-subulate, deciduous; flowers greenish white or purplish; sepals ovate to lance-elliptic, obtuse to acuminate, 1-1.6 mm. long; wings obovate, 2-2.2 mm. long, rounded at the apex, cuneate at the base; keel about 2 mm. long, the crest on each side consisting of a cuneate lamella and 2 entire or 2-parted lobes; capsule oblique-oval, emarginate, rounded at the base, glabrous, with 6-7 conspicuous, usually greenish veins on each side of the septum and also evidently transverse-rugose, winged on the upper side at the apex, 3 mm. long; seed cylindric, often curved, pubescent, 1.8 mm. long, the aril 1 mm. long, its 2 linear lobes ap- pressed. Polygala Salviniana A. W. Benn. Journ. Bot. 17: 203. 1879. P. macroloncha Chodat, Bot. Jahrb. 52, Beibl. 115: 84. 1914 (type from Zaragoza, Chimaltenango, Seler 2925). P. microloncha Chodat, loc. cit. (type collected near Chacula, Huehuetenango, Seler 3138). P. oxysepala Blake, Contr. Gray Herb. 47: 109. 1916 (type from Santa Rosa, Baja Verapaz, Tuerckheim 1202). Peor es nada (Hue- huetenango). Open hillsides, fields, or brushy slopes, often in pine or oak forest, 900-2,700 meters; Baja Verapaz; Jalapa; Santa Rosa; Sacatepe"quez (type from Volcan de Fuego, above Las Calderas, Salving; Chimal- tenango; Solola; Quiche"; Huehuetenango; Quezaltenango. Hon- duras. Perennial from a somewhat ligneous root, the stems usually several, slender and wiry, erect or ascending, simple or sparsely branched, 60 cm. long or less, strigillose or puberulent; leaves alternate, linear-acicular, 5-13 mm. long, cuspidate, 1-nerved, sparsely puberulent or almost glabrous; racemes lax or rather dense, 7 mm. thick, 6 cm. long or shorter, the bracts subulate, deciduous; flowers short- pedicellate, greenish white; sepals ovate or ovate-lanceolate, obtuse to acuminate, 1-1.8 mm. long; wings obovate, 3-3.5 mm. long, obtuse; capsule elliptic, 2.5 mm. long; seed oblong, pubescent, 2 mm. long, the aril 1.2-1.5 mm. long, the 2 lobes oblong. This has been reported from Guatemala as P. scoparia HBK. Polygala Securidaca Chodat, Bot. Jahrb. 52, Beibl. 115: 76. 1914. Hierba grande. 20 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 Common in mountain forests of Honduras; to be expected in the mountains of Chiquimula. A shrub, the branches subtomentose when young; leaves short-petiolate, alternate, ovate-elliptic, 4-7 cm. long, obtuse, rounded at the base, subcoriaceous, softly tomentulose; racemes terminal, solitary or subpaniculate, short-cylindric, 3-5 cm. long, 2.5 cm. broad, the rachis tomentulose or hirsute, the pedicels hirsute, 7 mm. long; flowers purple, 10-12 mm. long. Polygala Seleri Chodat, Bot. Jahrb. 52, Beibl. 115: 73. 1914. Known only from the type, from Cuesta de la Concepcion, Jacaltenango, Huehuetenango, Seler 3244. Perennial from a ligneous root, the stems slender, branched, 20-30 cm. long, puberulent; leaves alternate, short-petiolate, ovate or ovate-lanceolate, 3-5.5 cm. long, acute or acuminate, glabrate; racemes rather lax, 5-10 cm. long, the flowers violet, 9 mm. long, short-pedicellate; upper sepal very acute; wings elliptic-oblong, glabrous, obtuse or short-acute, twice as long as broad, 9 mm. long; ovary long- pilose; immature capsule orbicular, ciliate. We know this plant only by a photograph of the type. Polygala trichoptera Chodat, Bot. Jahrb. 52, Beibl. 115: 74. 1914. Known only from the original material, limestone hillsides, Uaxacanal, Huehuetenango, 1,300-1,400 meters, Seler 2796, 2904. Perennial, the stems slender, erect, hirsute, 10-20 cm. high, simple or sparsely branched; leaves lance-elliptic to lanceolate or linear, sparsely hirsute above, conspicuously venose beneath, 2-4 cm. long, 7-16 mm. wide; racemes 7-12- flowered, 2-4 cm. long, the pedicels 2.5 mm. long; flowers violaceous, 6 mm. long; sepals lance-linear, hirsute, acute; wings obovate-oblong, very obtuse, sparsely long-pilose dorsally; immature capsule elliptic-obovate, very hirsute. We have seen nothing to represent this species. Polygala variabilis HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 5: 397. pi. 509. 1823. P. variabilis f. leucanthema Blake, Contr. Gray Herb. 47: 96. 1916. Cola de mico. Open rocky slopes, sometimes in savannas, 1,500 meters or less; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Jutiapa. Southern Mexico; British Honduras; South America. A slender erect annual, simple or sparsely branched, the stems obscurely stipitate-glandular, especially below; leaves alternate, linear, 4-9 mm. long; racemes short and thick, rather dense, 7-10 mm. broad, usually about as long as broad, the axis sometimes elongating in age; flowers short-pedicellate, rose-purple or sometimes white; sepals ovate, rounded or obtuse at the apex, 1-2 mm. long; wings elliptic, 2.7-3.5 mm. long, rounded at the apex; keel cristate; capsule ovate- STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 21 oblong, 2.5-3 mm. long; seed obconic, sericeous-comose, 2.7 mm. long, the aril 2-lobate, 0.5 mm. high, appressed. In the typical form the flowers are rose-purple; in f. leucanthema they are white. Both forms have been collected in Guatemala. SECURIDACA Jacquin Mostly woody vines, rarely erect shrubs; leaves alternate, entire, broad, short- petiolate, generally with stipular glands; flowers rather large for the family, mostly rose-colored, in terminal and axillary, often paniculate racemes; sepals 5, free, deciduous, the 3 outer ones herbaceous, the 2 inner ones (wings) much larger, petaloid; petals 3, deciduous, united at the base, the lowest (keel) boat-shaped, unguiculate, with a subapical fimbriate crest, the 2 upper petals united with the base of the stamen tube; stamens 8, the filaments united almost to the apex to form a sheath; anthers confluently 1-celled, opening by a large introrse-apical pore; disk a low fleshy ring at the base of the ovary; ovary 1-celled, the style sickle-shaped, excavate at the apex, the stigma lobes 2, approximate; ovule solitary, pendulous; fruit a 1-celled 1-seeded samara, with a large wing on the lower side, sometimes marginate on the upper side or rarely almost equally winged; seed glabrous, not arillate, the testa thin; endosperm none; cotyledons thick- fleshy, oily. About 30 species in tropical America, Africa, and Asia. Two other Central American species have been found in Costa Rica and Panama. Pubescence of the lower leaf surface of closely appressed hairs S. diversifolia. Pubescence of the lower leaf surface of spreading hairs S. sylvestris. Securidaca diversifolia (L.) Blake, Contr. U. S. Nat. Herb. 23: 594. 1923. Polygala diversifolia L. Sp. PL 703. 1753. S. erecta Jacq. Enum. PL Carib. 27. 1760. Bejuco anisillo (Pete"n, fide Lundell). Moist or dry thickets, often in second growth, sometimes in forest, 1,800 meters or less, mostly at 300 meters or lower; Pete*n; Izabal; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Santa Rosa; Escuintla; Retalhuleu. Mexico; British Honduras to Panama; Lesser Antilles; South America. A small or large, woody vine, the branches slender, strigose; leaves on very short petioles, elliptic-oblong to broadly ovate or oval, 4-10 cm. long, 2-5.5 cm. wide, obtuse or acute, rounded or cuneate at the base, chartaceous, sparsely or densely strigillose on both surfaces, paler beneath, lustrous above, the venation rather prominent and closely reticulate on both surfaces; racemes many-flowered, simple or branched, 5-10 cm. long, the bracts lanceolate to ovate, acuminate, deciduous; pedicels 4-7 mm. long, the flowers rose or purple; sepals oval, ciliate, 2.5-3.5 mm. long; wings 8-11 mm. long; body of the samara turgid, elevated- reticulate, 5-8 mm. long, the wing obovate, 3-5 cm. long, 1-1.5 cm. wide near the middle, strigose or glabrate. 22 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 This and the following are handsome and showy vines, often producing large masses of beautiful, rose-colored or purple flowers. Apparently the vines flower for only a short time. The flowers much resemble those of Leguminosae, and most persons on seeing the plants for the first time assume that they belong to that family. Securidaca sylvestris Schlecht. Linnaea 14: 381. 1840. Moist or dry thickets or mixed forest, often in second growth, 2,000 meters or less; Pete"n; Alta Verapaz; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Jutiapa; Escuintla; Solola; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Western and southern Mexico; British Honduras; Honduras; Costa Rica. A small or large, woody vine, the branches densely hirtellous or pilosulous; leaves on very short petioles, ovate to oblong-elliptic, 3-7 cm. long, 1.5-3 cm. wide, acute or obtuse, rounded or cuneate at the base, sparsely or densely pilosulous on both surfaces with spreading hairs, lustrous above, paler beneath, the venation prominent and closely reticulate on both surfaces; racemes lax or dense, 10 cm. long or less, the bracts ovate or lance-ovate, deciduous, 1.5-4 mm. long, the pedicels 4-6 mm. long, the flowers rose-purple; sepals oval or rounded, 2.5-4 mm. long, ciliate and pilosulous; wings 8-11 mm. long; body of the samara 7-9 mm. long, reticulate, the wing obovate, 3-4 cm. long, 12-14 mm. wide, short-pilosulous. This is perhaps the plant reported by Hemsley from Guatemala as S. mollis HBK. on the basis of a Friedrichsthal collection. The locality is not cited, and there is no certainty that the plant came from Guatemala. S. mollis is a synonym of S. coriacea Bonpl., a species ranging from South America north into Panama. In Salvador S. sylvestris is called Coralmeca, and it is used there, with salt, in treating certain diseases of cattle. The vine is said to be used there also as a barbasco or fish poison. Seeds of these plants seem to be spread widely by some means, for small sterile plants are common in fields where no adult plants are found, and they often invade cultivated fields. DICHAPETALACEAE Reference: H. A. Gleason, N. Amer. Fl. 25: 381-383. 1924. Trees or shrubs, sometimes scandent; leaves alternate, 2-ranked, entire, mem- branaceous or coriaceous, short-petiolate, penninerved; stipules small and narrow, deciduous; inflorescence a loose or dense cyme, sometimes capitate, axillary, the peduncle often adnate to the petiole; bracts small and narrow, deciduous; flowers sessile or short-pedicellate, small and inconspicuous, perfect or unisexual, regular or somewhat zygomorphic; receptacle flat or concave; sepals 5, imbricate, free or slightly connate at the base, equal or nearly so; petals 5, alternate with the sepals, free or connate into a short tube, equal or conspicuously unequal, often bifid or bilobate and more or less involute or cucullate; stamens 5, alternate with STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 23 the petals, either free, hypogynous, and with slender complanate filaments some- what dilated at the base, or epipetalous with nearly or quite sessile anthers; anthers usually 5, sometimes 3, 2-celled, introrse, with a broad connective; hypogynous disk unilateral in zygomorphic flowers, of 5 scales alternate with the stamens in regular flowers; ovary superior, 2-3-celled; styles 2-3, united below, with recurved stigmas; ovules 2 in each cell, suspended near the summit of the cell, anatropous; fruit drupaceous, more or less compressed, the exocarp thin, leathery or fleshy; seed usually 1, without endosperm. Three genera, in the tropics of both hemispheres. Only the following genus is known from continental North America. DICHAPETALUM Thouars Trees or shrubs, sometimes woody vines; leaves short-petiolate, usually mem- branaceous; stipules linear or narrowly lanceolate; inflorescence usually laxly cymose, with few or many flowers, arising from the axils of the upper leaves, the peduncle adnate for part of its length to the petiole; flowers small, whitish, short- pedicellate, perfect or unisexual, regular or nearly so; receptacle flat or somewhat concave; sepals free or barely connate at the base, equal or subequal, spreading or ascending; petals free, equal or nearly so, ascending or erect, short-unguiculate, bifid or bilobate, the apex cucullate; stamens free and distinct, the filaments slender, compressed, somewhat dilated below; anthers 5; hypogynous disk of 5 minute scales. About 80 species in the tropics of both hemispheres, most abun- dant in Africa. Two other species are known in Central America, from Costa Rica and Panama. Branches of the inflorescence and the sepals hirsute or hispid with long stiff spread- ing hairs; leaves hirsute beneath, the veins conspicuously impressed on the upper surface D. bullatum. Branches of the inflorescence and sepals short-pilose or puberulent; leaves velu- tinous-pilose to glabrate beneath, the veins not or only slightly impressed on the upper surface. Leaf blades mostly oblong or lance-oblong, somewhat narrowed to a rounded base, mostly 3-5 cm. wide, puberulent or sparsely pilose beneath, the hairs of the costa often appressed D. chiapense. Leaf blades mostly broadly obovate to oblong-obovate, usually acute, acutish, or merely obtuse at the base, generally 7-13 cm. wide, densely velutinous- pilose beneath with spreading hairs D. Donnell-Smithii. Dichapetalum bullatum Standl. & Steyerm. Field Mus. Bot. 23: 169. 1944. Moist or wet thickets or mixed forest, sometimes in Manicaria swamps, 500 meters or usually at or near sea level; endemic; Izabal (type collected along road between Puerto Barrios and Santo Tomas, Steyermark 39874). An erect or subscandent shrub, the branchlets thick, ochraceous, usually lustrous, when young densely hispid with stiff, sordid or brownish hairs; leaves 24 FIELD IANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 very large, short-petiolate, thick-membranaceous, strongly bullate, the thick petiole 5-8 mm. long, densely hispid; leaf blades elliptic or broadly elliptic, some- times oblong-elliptic, 17-28 cm. long, 11-18 cm. wide, abruptly acute or acuminate, rounded or subcordate at the base, sparsely hispid above or in age glabrate, the nerves and veins conspicuously impressed, densely hirsute or hispid beneath with rather long, stiff hairs, the veins elevated and laxly reticulate; inflorescence small, terminal or pseudoterminal, branched from the base or composed of several simple inflorescences, the primary branches very slender, 1-1.5 cm. long, densely hispid, the flowers umbellate at the end of the peduncle, the long slender pedicels almost filiform, hispidulous; sepals narrowly oblong, obtuse, 3-3.5 mm. long, densely whitish-tomentulose outside and hispid with appressed stiff white hairs; petals about as long as the sepals, bilobate at the apex, glabrous, white turning blackish purple in drying; filaments very slender, glabrous, longer than the petals; ovary densely white-tomentose. Dichapetalum chiapense Standl. Field Mus. Bot. 17: 196. 1937. Wet forest or thickets, 1,500 meters or less; Pete*n; Alta Verapaz; Suchitepe"quez; Huehuetenango. Chiapas, the type from Mt. Ovando, E. Matuda 679; British Honduras; Atlantic coast of Honduras. Shrub or small tree as much as 8 meters high, sometimes scandent, the branch- lets closely fulvous-tomentulose or glabrate; petioles stout, 5-8 mm. long, the blades mostly oblong or lance-oblong, subcoriaceous, 8-13 cm. long and 2-3.5 cm. wide or larger, usually gradually acuminate or long-acuminate, generally somewhat narrowed to the rounded or very obtuse, often somewhat unequal base, dark green above when dried, glabrous or somewhat tomentose along the costa, more or less pilose beneath at first with chiefly appressed hairs, later glabrate, with about 9 pairs of lateral nerves, the ultimate veins prominent and laxly reticulate; inflorescence small, with few to many flowers, the branches densely fulvous- tomentose; fruit 1-2-celled, when 1-celled broadly oval or subglobose, about 2 cm. long and 1.5 cm. wide, densely fulvous-tomentose. Dichapetalum Donnell-Smithii Engler, Bot. Jahrb. 23: 144. 1896. Symphyllanthus Donnell-Smithii Gleason, N. Amer. Fl. 25: 381. 1924. Moist or dry thickets and forest, 1,800 meters or less, chiefly in the Pacific bocacosta; endemic; Alta Verapaz; Santa Rosa; Es- cuintla (type from Escuintla, J. D. Smith 2067); Sacatepe"quez ; Chimaltenango; Retalhuleu; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Usually a shrub but sometimes a tree of 10 meters, the young branchlets densely fulvous-tomentose or short-pilose; leaves on very short petioles, usually very thin and bright green, oblong-obovate to broadly obovate, mostly 10-25 cm. long and 7-13 cm. wide, sometimes larger, commonly obtuse or rounded at the apex and abruptly acuminate, mostly acute or subacute at the base but rarely somewhat rounded, sparsely or densely pilose above, beneath usually densely velutinous-pilose, the lateral nerves mostly 5-7 pairs; cymes small and usually STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 25 few-flowered, the branches densely fulvous-pilose; sepals spreading, rounded- ovate, obtuse, densely tomentose outside; petals shorter than the sepals, 2 mm. long, bifid almost to the middle; fruit brownish, compressed-ellipsoid, 1.5-2 cm. long, densely velutinous-pilose. The species has been 'reported from Guatemala under the name D. pedunculatum Baillon. The shrub is a common one at many localities in the Pacific bocacosta or even far down upon the plains, but it is inconspicuous, even when in flower, when it reminds one somewhat of some of the shrubby Lauraceae. The plants of this genus are best marked by the fact that the peduncles are united with the petioles, a character not found in other Guatemalan plants. EUPHORBIACEAE. Spurge Family Trees, shrubs or herbs, sometimes scandent and twining, mostly with milky sap; leaves chiefly alternate, sometimes opposite or verticillate, simple or rarely digitately compound, sometimes palmate-lobate, dentate or entire; stipules often present; inflorescence highly variable in form, the flowers usually small but some- times large, unisexual, monoecious or dioecious, generally regular; perianth some- times none, usually small, often dissimilar in flowers of the 2 sexes, either a calyx or a calyx and a corolla, the segments free or united, imbricate or valvate in bud; staminate flowers with an intrastaminal or extrastaminal disk, or this of separate glands or lobes; stamens sometimes indefinite, often as many as the sepals or fewer, sometimes only 1, the filaments free or united; rudimentary ovary present or none; disk of the pistillate flower annual or cupular, or of separate glands, or absent; ovary usually 3-celled, sometimes 1-4-celled or the cells rarely more numerous; styles as many as the carpels, free or connate, entire, cleft, or laciniate; ovules 1 in each cell, or 2 and collateral, pendulous, anatropous, attached at the inner angle of the cell, the raphe ventral; micropyle often covered with a caruncle, this persistent and conspicuous on the seed; fruit generally capsular and separating into 2-valvate cocci, these separating from the persistent axis or columella, or the fruit drupaceous and indehiscent; seeds commonly as many as the ovules; endo- sperm usually abundant and carnose, the cotyledons broad and flat, rarely thick and carnose. One of the largest families of plants, with more than 200 genera and 7,000 species. Other genera besides those listed here are repre- sented in southern Central America, mostly groups consisting of a single species. The majority of the plants of the family are dis- tinguished by the combination of milky sap and dry 3-celled fruit, but there are numerous exceptions. The family includes many plants of great economic importance, the most valuable being Hevea, from which practically all commercial rubber is obtained. In many species the sap is poisonous or at least highly irritant, and the seeds often possess purgative properties, or in large amounts are poisonous. The family has been monographed by Pax in the 26 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 Pflanzenreich, as noted on the following pages. The work has been exceptionally well done, and all the genera have been covered except a few of the very large ones, notably Croton, Phyllanthus, and Euphorbia. The nomenclature in the groups that have not been treated is, naturally, not altogether satisfactory, and it is likely that numerous changes in names will have to be made when these large genera are treated critically. Flowers surrounded by a calyx-like or slipper-shaped involucre containing both staminate and pistillate flowers; perianth none or minute. Involucre calyx-like or cupular, regular Euphorbia. Involucre slipper-shaped or shoe-shaped, very asymmetric Pedilanthus. Flowers not involucrate or, if so, the involucre containing only staminate or pistillate flowers, never shoe-shaped; perianth usually present and well developed. Ovules 2 in each cell; flowers apetalous or the petals, when present, usually small and scale-like; flowers fasciculate or solitary in the leaf axils, rarely spicate. Fruit capsular; pubescence not lepidote. Flowers partly in stiff spikes or racemes; leaves coriaceous Amanoa. Flowers axillary and solitary or fasciculate, or in slender racemes or panicles; leaves usually membranaceous. Petals well developed, relatively large Astrocasia. Petals minute or none Phyllanthus. Fruit drupaceous; pubescence sometimes lepidote. Pubescence lepidote Hieronyma. Pubescence not lepidote Drypetes. Ovules 1 in each cell; petals often well developed; flowers often in racemes, spikes, or panicles. Stamens in bud bent inward, the apex of the anther turned downward. Flowers usually with petals, mostly in terminal racemes. Sepals equal or nearly so, not appendaged Croton. Sepals unequal, the outer ones of the pistillate flowers with conspicuous stalked glands or appendages Julocroton. Stamens straight in bud, the tips of the anthers turned upward. Flowers in dichotomous cymes. Plants often armed with stinging hairs, herbaceous or woody, never scandent. Plants bearing few or usually very numerous stinging hairs . Cnidoscolus. Plants without stinging hairs Jatropha. Flowers variously arranged but never in dichotomous cymes. Inflorescence subtended by 2 large, opposite, green, white, or reddish, foliaceous bracts, these about as broad as long; plants twining herbs or shrubs, or rarely low erect shrubs, the leaves often digitately compound or deeply lobate Dalechampia. Inflorescence not as described above. Leaves deeply lobate. Leaves peltate; calyx lobes valvate; stamens numerous. . . .Ricinus. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 27 Leaves usually not peltate; calyx lobes imbricate; stamens 10. Manihot. Leaves entire or dentate, rarely with one or two very shallow lobes. Leaves mottled or spotted with red, yellow or white, entire or ob- scurely lobate; cultivated shrubs, rarely escaping to thickets. Codiaeum. Leaves not mottled with other colors than green; chiefly native plants. Segments of the staminate calyx valvate in bud. Stipules indurate and spinescent Ophellantha. Stipules not spinescent, sometimes none. Staminate flowers with well-developed petals. Plants sericeous; capsule not tuberculate. . Petals 8-12; stamens numerous Garcia. Petals 4-5; stamens 5-15 Ditaxis. Plants hirsute or hispidulous; capsule tuberculate. Caper onia. Staminate and pistillate flowers without petals. Plants twining and scandent, rarely erect but then with stinging hairs. Capsule 4-celled; plants woody, without stinging hairs. Plukenetia. Capsule 3-celled; plants herbaceous throughout or nearly so, usually with stinging hairs Tragia. Plants not twining or scandent, without stinging hairs. Anther cells elongate and narrow, often flexuous; flowers spicate or racemose, sometimes subcapitate; herbs, shrubs, or small trees Acalypha. Anther cells short, globose or oblong; shrubs or trees. Flowers solitary or fasciculate in the leaf axils . . . Adelia. Flowers, at least the staminate ones, racemose, spicate, or paniculate. Staminate flowers paniculate Alchornea. Staminate flowers racemose or spicate. Pubescence of stellate hairs Bernardia. Pubescence of simple hairs, or none Cleidion. Segments of the staminate flowers imbricate or open in bud. Leaves with scattered brown scales on the lower surface; flowers enclosed in a globose involucre Pera. Leaves without scales; flowers not enclosed in an involucre. Petioles bearing conspicuous glands below the base of the blade. Leaves dentate Sapium. Leaves entire or essentially so Tetrorchidium. Petioles without glands, or the glands borne at the very apex. Flowers paniculate. Bracts foliaceous; panicles broad; leaves very large, cordate Omphalea. 28 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 Bracts not foliaceous; panicles raceme-like; leaves small, not cordate Mabea. Flowers spicate or racemose. Ovary 5-20-celled, the fruit very large; leaves glabrous. Leaves cordate at the base; fruit dry Hura. Leaves not cordate at the base; fruit fleshy . Hippomane. Ovary normally 3-celled. Leaves tomentose beneath; staminate flowers densely crowded on the rachis Dalembertia. Leaves glabrous; staminate flowers not densely crowded. Staminate calyx none or rudimentary . . Gymnanthes. Staminate calyx well developed. Calyx deeply 3-parted Sebastiania. Calyx shallowly lobate Stillingia. ACALYPHA L. Reference: F. Pax & K. Hoffmann, Acalypha, Pflanzenreich IV. 147, xvi. 1924. Annual or perennial herbs or more frequently shrubs or small trees; leaves alternate, petiolate, bistipulate, mostly ovate, dentate, 3-5-nerved or penninerved, often puncticulate; flowers monoecious or rarely dioecious, apetalous, small or minute; staminate flowers glomerate within small bracts, short-pedicellate; pistil- late flowers 1-5 within a conspicuous, often accrescent bract, or pedicellate in the axis of a small, scarcely foliaceous bract; inflorescences unisexual or bisexual, the staminate usually ament-like, slender, the pistillate inflorescence paniculate, racemose, or usually spicate; androgynous spikes usually with pistillate flowers below and staminate above; androgynous and pistillate inflorescences axillary or terminal, the staminate ones always axillary; disk none; staminate calyx globose in bud, in anthesis valvately 4-parted; stamens generally 8, the filaments free; anther cells distinct, divaricate or pendulous, oblong or linear, in the open flower flexuous- vermiform; pistillate sepals 3-5, connate at the very base or rarely higher, small, imbricate; ovary usually 3-celled, often muricate; styles free or short-connate, generally lacinulate; ovules solitary in the cells; capsule generally small, tridymous, the cocci bivalvate; seeds small, subglobose, distinctly or obsoletely carunculate, the testa crustaceous; endosperm carnose, the cotyledons broad, flat. Species almost or fully 400, in both hemispheres, chiefly in tropical regions, very few extending into temperate areas. A few other species are found in southern Central America. Pistillate flowers pedicellate; pistillate bracts minute. Leaves very glutinous on the upper surface, glabrous on both surfaces. A. gummifera. Leaves not glutinous-viscid. Leaves broadly ovate, broadest at or near the base, palmate-nerved. A. villosa. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 29 Leaves oblong to lance-oblong or elliptic-oblong, penninerved or essentially so. A. costaricensis. Pistillate flowers sessile; pistillate bracts mostly large and foliaceous. Shrubs, trees, or herbs. Plants herbaceous, mostly annual, sometimes perennial. Lobes or teeth of the pistillate bracts short, oblong or ovate, obtuse, little if at all exceeding the united portion of the bract. Inflorescences all or mostly axillary, very lax and interrupted. A low annual A. indica. Inflorescences partly terminal, very dense. Spikes mostly twice as long as broad or shorter; plants annual. Stems bearing numerous gland-tipped hairs. . . . A. pseudoalopecuroides. Stems without gland-tipped hairs A. Poiretii. Spikes several times as long as broad; plants usually perennial. Stems stipitate-glandular A. subviscida. Stems without glandular pubescence. Leaves small, mostly 3 cm. long or shorter, obtuse or acute. A. phleoides. Leaves all or mostly much larger, usually acuminate. Leaves hirsute with long stiff spreading hairs A. triloba. Leaves sparsely pilose or hispidulous with short hairs. A. guatemalensis. Lobes of the pistillate bracts linear or filiform, much longer than the united portion of the bract. Spikes 3 times as long as broad or usually shorter, mostly 3 cm. long or less. Spikes all axillary; leaves mostly obtuse A. arvensis. Spikes partly terminal; leaves abruptly acuminate A. alopecuroides. Spikes several to many times as long as broad, most of them much more than 3 cm. long, at least at maturity. Ovary and capsule pubescent. Fruiting bracts cleft almost to the base into 7-13 slender, almost subulate lobes A. setosa. Fruiting bracts incisely 19-25-dentate to about the middle or somewhat more deeply A. persimilis, Ovary and capsule glabrous A. polystachya. Plants shrubs or trees, woody throughout or nearly so, when shrubs usually tall and more than a meter high. Inflorescences terminal and axillary, the terminal spikes wholly pistillate, all or nearly all the pistillate spikes terminal only. Leaves penninerved, all or most of them broadest at or above the middle. Branches hirsute with spreading fulvous hairs; leaves usually densely pilose beneath A. lancetillae. Branches glabrous or pubescent with very short, appressed hairs; leaves glabrous beneath or nearly so. Bracts pilose with gland-tipped hairs, equaling or longer than the capsule A. Ferdinandi. Bracts without gland-tipped hairs, shorter than the capsule . A . Skutchii. 30 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 Leaves palmate-nerved, ovate or usually very broadly ovate, broadest at or near the base. Lowest pistillate bracts leaf-like, much larger than the upper ones, some- times 5 cm. long A. chlorocardia. Lowest pistillate bracts not leaf-like, of about the same size as the upper ones. Leaves 7-12 cm. wide, coarsely crenate, densely and finely velutinous- pilose beneath A. Mortoniana. Leaves mostly 2-6 cm. wide, finely crenate, variously pubescent be- neath or almost glabrous. Pistillate spikes slender, much interrupted A. firmula. Pistillate spikes dense, continuous. Pistillate bracts 7-10-dentate A. Schiedeana. Pistillate bracts mostly 11-15-dentate A. mollis. Inflorescences all axillary. Spikes bisexual, a few pistillate bracts present at the base of the spike which consists mostly of staminate flowers A. diver sifolia. Spikes unisexual, the staminate and pistillate flowers in separate spikes. Pistillate spikes short and globose or oblong, or bearing only 1-3 or rarely more bracts. Pistillate spikes globose or subglobose, with very numerous bracts. A. trachyloba. Pistillate spikes consisting of only 1-few scattered bracts. Pistillate spikes with mostly 3-6 remote bracts, or sometimes with only 1-2 A. euphrasiostachys. Pistillate spikes with only 1-2 bracts, mostly with only 1. Bracts 9-11-laciniate A. unibracteata. Bracts 13-17-laciniate A. leptopoda. Pistillate spikes slender, elongate, linear or oblong-linear, bearing very numerous bracts. Pistillate bracts entire, or sometimes dentate but the leaves then colored; cultivated plants. Pistillate bracts entire; leaves green A. hispida. Pistillate bracts dentate; leaves colored A. Wilkesiana. Pistillate bracts dentate or laciniate; leaves green; native plants. Branches densely glandular-pubescent A. Langiana. Branches without glandular pubescence. Leaves penninerved, broadest at or above the middle, glabrous or nearly so A. Ferdinandi. Leaves palmate-nerved, broadest at or near the base, glabrous or densely pubescent. Lowest bracts of the pistillate inflorescence leaf-like, much larger than the upper ones, sometimes 5 cm. long. A. chlorocardia. Lowest bracts of the pistillate spikes of about the same size as the upper ones. Pistillate bracts 2-lobate at the apex; leaves glabrous or nearly so A. tenuicauda. Pistillate bracts not bilobate; leaves usually densely pilose, sometimes almost glabrous A. macrostachya. STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 31 Acalypha alopecuroides Jacq. Icon. PI. Rar. 3: 19. pi. 620. 1786-93. Rocky mountain slopes with Juniperus, 1,350-1,500 meters; Huehuetenango. Southern Mexico; British Honduras; Honduras; Panama; West Indies; northern South America. An erect annual, mostly 50 cm. high or less, simple or sparsely branched, the stems pubescent and more or less glandular-pilose; leaves on slender petioles 2-6 cm. long, membranaceous, triangular-ovate or rounded-ovate, 3-7 cm. long, acuminate or cuspidate-acuminate, rounded or subcordate at the base, crenate, sparsely hirsute or pilosulous on both surfaces when young, glabrate in age, palmate-nerved, the petioles glandular-pilose above; spikes terminal and axillary, the terminal ones pistillate, in fruit sometimes 5 cm. long, 1-1.5 cm. wide, very dense and many-flowered, the pistillate ones often bearing a few staminate flowers at the apex, the axillary spikes wholly staminate or with a few pistillate flowers at the base; pistillate bracts 7-9 mm. long, 3-5-lobate almost to the middle, the lobes triangular-ovate, setaceous, long-pilose and glandular, 1-flowered; ovary pilose, the styles 2-fid or entire; capsule 2 mm. long, the lobes dorsally carinate; seeds 1 mm. long, narrowly ovoid. The Maya name in Yucatan is recorded as "xmizbil"; names reported from Salvador are "taba de polio," "gusanillo," and "tarco," but these may pertain rather to A. arvensis. The species is rare in most parts of Central America, the majority of the collections re- ported from that area as A. alopecuroides being rather A. arvensis. Acalypha arvensis Poepp. & Endl. Nov. Gen. 3: 21. 1845. Hierba del cancer; Gusanillo; Gusanito; Mata-gusano; Corrimiento (Pete"n); Sajoi (Petatan, Huehuetenango); Ccul (Chimaltenango, fide Tejada); Ztajnoy (Quiche", fide Tejada). Moist or wet thickets, fields, or banks, often a weed in cultivated or waste ground, frequent on sandbars along streams, 1,500 meters or less; Pete"n; Alta Verapaz; Izabal; El Progreso; Zacapa; Santa Rosa; Escuintla; Guatemala; Suchitepe"quez ; Retalhuleu; San Marcos; Huehuetenango. Southern Mexico; British Honduras; Honduras; Costa Rica; Panama; Martinique; tropical South America. Plants annual, erect or ascending, usually 50 cm. high or less, simple or branched, the stems sometimes more elongate, procumbent, and rooting at the lower nodes, spreading-pilose or glabrate, densely pubescent on the younger parts; leaves membranaceous, on petioles 2-3.5 cm. long, rhombic-ovate or rhombic- lanceolate, mostly 3-7 cm. long, acute or obtuse, obtuse at the base, palmate- nerved, crenate-serrate, pilose on both surfaces with spreading or appressed hairs or sometimes glabrate; spikes slender-pedunculate, axillary, androgynous, the upper ones almost wholly pistillate, 1.5-2.5 cm. long, 10-13 mm. broad, bearing a few staminate flowers at the apex; lower spikes almost wholly staminate, 2 mm. 32 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 thick; fruiting bracts 5 mm. wide, 4-7-lobate to the middle, the lobes triangular- ovate, filiform-acuminate, hirsute, some of the hairs gland-tipped; styles lacinulate; capsule 2 mm. broad, pilose; seeds broadly ovoid, 1 mm. long. Called "gatito" in Yucatan; "espinosilla" (Oaxaca); "hierba del gusano" (Veracruz). The plant is known everywhere in Guatemala by the name "hierba del cancer," and it is much used in household medicine. There is a general belief among the country people that it is a remedy for "cancer" (of which they often have very vague ideas), and it is used commonly in treating sores, cutaneous and venereal diseases, and the bites of various poisonous animals. Acalypha chlorocardia Standl. Field Mus. Bot. 8: 18. 1930. Known only from the type, Middlesex, British Honduras, on river bank, 60 meters, W. A. Schipp S-45. A shrub a meter high, the young branches rather densely hirsute with long spreading whitish hairs; stipules 1 cm. long, linear-subulate, glandular-denticulate; leaves membranaceous, on petioles 12-16 cm. long, ovate or broadly ovate, 12-15 cm. long, 7-9 cm. wide, long-acuminate, rounded and shallowly cordate at the base, closely appressed-serrate, sparsely hirsute above, thinly hispidulous beneath, palmately 5-7-nerved at the base; terminal spike pistillate, 19 cm. long, rather dense, the bracts numerous, the lowest ones resembling the leaves, as much as 7 cm. long, narrowly long-acuminate, the upper ones sessile, cordate-clasping, 1 cm. long, about 15-serrate, acuminate, appressed-hispidulous, the uppermost bracts only 5 mm. long, acute, crenate-serrate; pistillate flowers sessile; ovary densely hispidulous; style branches multilacinulate. From the single sheet of this species it is difficult to decide whether the pistillate spikes are really terminal. In general appearance the plant resembles A. macrostachya. Acalypha costaricensis (Kuntze) Knobloch in Just, Bot. Jahresb. 19: 337. 1894. Ricinocarpus costaricensis Kuntze, Rev. Gen. 615. 1891. Moist or wet, usually dense, mixed forest or thickets, 2,000 meters or less; Izabal; Escuintla; Sacatepe"quez; Chimaltenango; Suchitepe"quez; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Chiapas; British Honduras; Honduras; Costa Rica. A slender shrub 1.5-5 meters high, the young branches green, terete, at first densely pubescent or hirsute, soon glabrate; leaves thin, bright green, on slender petioles 4-12 cm. long, oblong or elliptic-oblong, mostly 10-20 cm. long and 4-10 cm. wide, long-acuminate, obtuse or acute at the base or often rounded or cuneate to a narrow, subtruncate or subcordate base, coarsely crenate-dentate, essentially penninerved, glabrous or nearly so or often hirsute beneath or on both surfaces, the lateral nerves 6-11 pairs; flowers monoecious or dioecious; pistillate inflores- cence terminal, paniculate, usually lax and much-branched, often 20 cm. long, STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 33 pedunculate, the branches hirsute or almost glabrous; pistillate bracts very small, 1-2-flowered, the pedicels 1.5 mm. long or more; ovary densely muricate; style elongate, pinnate-lacinulate, usually purple-red. A very common shrub in the Atlantic lowlands, often in second growth. Material of this species has been reported from Guatemala as A. Schlechtendaliana Muell. Arg., a species of southern Mexico that does not reach Central America, so far as our material indicates. The key characters used by Pax and Hoffman for separating these two species are not reliable, but it is believed that both are good species, separable on other characters. Acalypha diversifolia Jacq. PI. Hort. Schoenbr. 2: 63. pi. 244. 1797. A. leptostachya HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 2: 96. 1817. A. diversifolia var. leptostachya Muell. Arg. in DC. Prodr. 15, pt. 2: 854. 1866. A. tabascensis Lundell, Lloydia 4: 51. 1941. Cacucup (Alta Verapaz); Cliche (Maya); Palo de sangre (Pete"n, fide Lundell). Moist or wet thickets or forest, often in second growth thickets, sometimes in open pine forest, 1,000 meters or less; Pete"n; Alta Verapaz; Izabal. Southern Mexico; British Honduras to Panama; tropical South America. Usually a rather slender shrub of 1.5-3 meters, sometimes a tree of 6 meters, the branches often elongate and recurved, when young villous or appressed-pilose, in age glabrate and brown or reddish brown; leaves thick-membranaceous, on petioles 1-2 cm. long or rarely longer, oblong-lanceolate to oblong-ovate, mostly 7-15 cm. long, acuminate or long-acuminate, obtuse at the base, serrate or crenate, penninerved, with 6-9 pairs of lateral nerves, velutinous-pubescent or glabrate; stipules 5-6 mm. long, linear-setaceous from a broad base; flowers monoecious; spikes axillary, staminate or androgynous and then with 1-2 pistillate bracts at the base, 5-11 cm. long, 2-4 mm. thick, sessile or subsessile, the staminate portion of the spike often deciduous, or the inflorescence wholly pistillate and consisting of 1 or few crowded pistillate bracts; pistillate bracts obtuse or acute, shallowly few-dentate, 1-3-flowered, in fruit 4-6 mm. broad; ovary muricate, hispidulous; styles pinnately lacinulate; capsule almost 3 mm. broad; seeds 1.5 mm. long, minutely puncticulate. Known in Honduras as "costilla de caballo" and "costilla de danto"; "tapa-camino" (Veracruz). This is a very common shrub of second growth thickets along almost the whole Atlantic coast of Central America. Acalypha euphrasiostachys Bartlett, Proc. Amer. Acad. 43: 55. 1907. Known in Guatemala only from the type, Zacapa, Dept. Zacapa, 185 meters, C. C. Deam 190. Also in the State of Mexico, Mexico. 34 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 A slender shrub 1-2 meters high, the young branches hispidulous and puberu- lent, in age glabrate and dark reddish brown; leaves membranaceous, on slender petioles 1-2 cm. long, ovate or elliptic-ovate, 3-8 cm. long, 2-4.5 cm. wide, abruptly acuminate, obtuse to subcordate at the base, serrate, palmately 3-5-nerved, thinly or rather densely soft-pilose on both surfaces with rather short, spreading, soft hairs; spikes all axillary, the staminate about 1 cm. long, lax and interrupted, sessile; pistillate spikes 2-7 cm. long, the bracts remote, usually 3-7, sometimes only 1-2, about 8 mm. long and 10 mm. wide, 1-flowered, about 13-dentate, with unequal subacuminate teeth, hispidulous and glandular-pubescent; ovary densely pilose; styles multilacinulate. A little-known plant, of somewhat uncertain status. Although placed by Pax and Hoffmann far apart from A. leptopoda, it is actually closely related to that species. Acalypha Ferdinand! K. Hoffm. Pflanzenreich IV. 147, xvi: 63. 1924. Moist or wet, mixed forest, often on limestone, 1,300 meters or less; Alta Verapaz (type from Cubilgiiitz, Tuerckheim 11.187); Izabal. Atlantic lowlands of Honduras; Costa Rica. A slender shrub 2 meters high, or sometimes a tree of 7 meters, the branches slender, usually glabrous; leaves firm-membranaceous, on slender petioles 1.5 cm. long or shorter, obovate-oblong to oblanceolate or lanceolate, usually broadest above the middle, 8-18 cm. long, 2.5-7 cm. wide, rather abruptly acuminate or caudate-acuminate, attenuate to a narrow, truncate or cordate base, serrate, penninerved, usually glabrous, the lateral nerves 7-10 pairs; stipules 5-10 mm. long, setaceous-filiform, rigid; flowers monoecious, the spikes axillary, 2.5-7 cm. long, short-pedunculate, the staminate very dense; pistillate spikes mostly in the upper leaf axils, sometimes terminal, lax, in fruit as much as 15 cm. long, the bracts remote, in fruit as much as 1 cm. long and wide, rounded-ovate, acute, 1-2-flowered, puberulent and stipitate-glandular, 13-15-dentate, the teeth short, acute or acuminate; ovary muricate, hirtellous and often stipitate-glandular; styles multilacinulate. Called "costilla de danto" in Honduras. This has been recorded from Guatemala as A. cuneata Muell. Arg. var. obovata Muell. Arg., a quite different South American species. Acalypha firmula Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34: 21. 1865 (type from Salvador). A. porphyrantha Standl. Journ. Arnold Arb. 11: 32. 1930 (type from Siguatepeque, Comayagua, Honduras). Hierba de San Antonio (fide Aguilar). Usually in moist or dry, pine or oak forest, 1,100-2,000 meters; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Guatemala. Honduras; Salvador. A slender shrub 1-3 meters high, the branches pilose with spreading hairs or almost glabrous, purplish-red or ferruginous in age; leaves firm-membranaceous, STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 35 on slender petioles 1-7 cm. long, ovate to broadly ovate or oblong-ovate, 3-11 cm. long, mostly abruptly long-acuminate, rounded and shallowly cordate at the base, crenate-serrate, glabrous or sometimes rather densely soft-pilose; staminate spikes axillary, sessile, dense, short; pistillate spikes terminal, subsessile, very lax and interrupted, the bracts in fruit only 3 mm. long, shallowly about 11-dentate, stipitate-glandular; styles bright purple-red, showy; ovary muricate and hirtellous; seeds almost 2 mm. long. The leaves frequently are deep purple on the lower surface. Acalypha guatemalensis Pax & Hoffm. Pflanzenreich IV. 147, xvi: 27. 1924. Hierba del c&ncer. Moist or dry fields or thickets, sometimes in rather open forest, especially of oak or Alnus, or on open banks, frequently a weed in cultivated ground, 750-2,500 meters; Baja Verapaz; Jalapa; Santa Rosa; Guatemala; Sacatepe"quez; Chimaltenango; Solola; Quiche"; Huehuetenango (type from Jacaltenango, Seler 3261) ; Quezaltenango. Honduras. Plants herbaceous, usually perennial but sometimes annual, erect or ascending, sometimes a meter high but usually lower, simple or branched, mostly erect, some- times decumbent, when young puberulent or pilosulous with ascending or sub- appressed hairs; leaves on petioles 3 cm. long or usually shorter, rounded-ovate or rhombic-ovate, 4-7 cm. long, acuminate or acute, obtuse to usually broadly rounded at the base, crenate, membranaceous, 5-nerved, thinly pilose along the nerves and veins or sometimes rather densely and softly pubescent, in age often glabrate; flowers monoecious, the spikes mostly androgynous, terminal and axillary, generally numerous, the larger ones 4-5 cm. long or more, very dense, many- flowered, pedunculate or subsessile; staminate portion of the spike short, dense; pistillate bracts in fruit 5 mm. broad, 5-7-lobate to the middle, setose and bearing short gland-tipped hairs, 1-2-flowered, the lobes lanceolate; ovary hirtellous; styles pinnately 6-10-lacinulate, purple-red; capsule tuber culate, 3 mm. in diam- eter; seeds ovoid, smooth, 2 mm. long. This has been reported from Guatemala as A. alopecuroides Jacq. Acalypha gummifera Lundell, Contr. Univ. Mich. Herb. 4: 10. 1940. Wet mixed forest, often or usually on limestone, 150-875 meters; Pete"n (type from Camp 34, British Honduras boundary, W. A. Schipp 1290); Alta Verapaz; Izabal. British Honduras. A slender shrub 1-2.5 meters high, glabrous throughout; leaves firm-mem- branaceous, on slender petioles 1-4 cm. long, lanceolate or narrowly lanceolate, 8-14 cm. long, 1-4 cm. wide, narrowly long-acuminate, narrowed to the narrowly rounded base, penninerved or somewhat 3-nerved at the base, remotely and incon- spicuously serrulate, very lustrous and glutinous-viscid on the upper surface, somewhat paler beneath, sparsely barbellate beneath in the axils of the nerves, the lateral nerves 5-6 pairs; flowers monoecious, the spikes axillary, the staminate 36 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 ones 3-6.5 cm. long, very dense; pistillate flowers paniculate, the panicles as much as 6 cm. long, with sparse filiform branches; capsule almost 3 mm. long, glabrous; seeds reddish brown, ovoid, 2 mm. long. The species is well marked by the very lustrous, glutinous upper surface of the leaves, a character found in no other local species. Acalypha hispida Burm. Fl. Ind. 203. pi. 61, f. 1. 1768. Perhaps native of the islands of the South Pacific, but grown for ornament in most tropical regions; planted commonly in Guatemala, mostly in the tierra caliente, but also in such places as Guatemala and Antigua. A shrub, the stout branches tomentulose at first; leaves slender-petiolate, broadly rhombic-ovate, 9-15 cm. long, cuspidate-acuminate, cuneately narrowed at the base, firm-membranaceous, serrate, glabrate, 3-nerved at the base, penni- nerved above; flowers dioecious; pistillate spikes axillary, pendent, 30 cm. long or less, very dense, the style branches red or purple-red; bracts small, ovate- lanceolate, entire, pubescent. Sometimes called "chenille plant" in English; "cola de zorro" (Salvador); "nemiz" (Maya); "cola de gato" (Yucatan). The very numerous, large, thick, drooping, bright red or purple-red flower spikes are very showy and ornamental. Acalypha indica L. Sp. PI. 1030. 1753. The typical form of this species is widely distributed in the Old World tropics. In tropical North America it is represented by the following variety: Acalypha indica var. mexicana (Muell. Arg.) Pax. & Hoffm. Pflanzenreich IV. 147, xvi: 35. 1924. A. mexicana Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34: 41. 1865. Moist or wet fields or thickets, usually a weed in waste or culti- vated ground, 1,200-2,400 meters; Alta Verapaz; Guatemala; Sacatepe"quez; Chimaltenango; Huehuetenango; Quezaltenango. Southern Mexico; Costa Rica. A slender annual, erect or decumbent, simple or usually branched, often branched from the base, mostly 50 cm. high or lower, the stems sparsely pubescent when young, soon glabrate; leaves on long slender petioles, thin, ovate or rhombic- ovate, 2-6 cm. long, acute or usually obtuse, cuneate or rounded at the base, crenate, glabrous or nearly so in age, 5-nerved at the base; spikes axillary, andro- gynous, solitary or geminate, mostly very short, the staminate portion 1 cm. long or less; pistillate bracts 1-4, often remote, foliaceous at maturity, suborbicular, 6-12 mm. broad, dentate, 1-2-flowered, sparsely setulose-pilose on the nerves; STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 37 ovary pilose, the style short, sparsely lacinulate; capsule short-pilose, 2 mm. broad; seeds broadly ovoid, 1.5 mm. long, minutely puncticulate. The occurrence of this plant in Guatemala is such that it may be presumed to be of foreign origin. It is rarely found except in culti- vated ground or in the immediate vicinity of settlements. Acalypha lancetillae Standl. Field Mus. Bot. 4: 312. 1929. Wet mixed lowland forest, at or little above sea level; Izabal. British Honduras; Atlantic coast of Honduras (type from Lancetilla Valley near Tela). A shrub or small tree 1-6 meters high, sparsely branched, the branches densely pilose with soft spreading hairs, the older ones pale brown; stipules setaceous 7-13 mm. long; leaves thin, on petioles 1-4 cm. long, oblong to obovate-oblong or oblanceolate, mostly 7-17 cm. long and 3-7 cm. wide, short-acuminate or long- acuminate, gradually narrowed below to the narrow, obtuse to shallowly cordate base, closely serrate, hirsute or hirtellous above, densely velutinous-pilose beneath, penninerved, the lateral nerves about 11 pairs; flowers monoecious, the staminate spikes dense, slender, axillary, subsessile, mostly 5-8 cm. long, 2 mm. thick; terminal spike about 7 cm. long and 1 cm. thick, the terminal portion caudiform, staminate, dense, the pistillate portion about 4.5 cm. long, short-pedunculate; pistillate bracts as much as 7 mm. long, cleft into about 11 linear-subulate lobes extending almost to the base of the bract, densely hispidulous, eglandular, the axillary pistillate spikes reduced to usually a single sessile bract; styles much elongate, with very numerous capillary branches; capsule hispidulous. Acalypha Langiana Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34: 159. 1865. In canyon, 1,100 meters, Guatemala (Fiscal, C. C. Deam 6108). Southern Mexico. A slender shrub about a meter high, the branches densely short-pilose and bearing numerous short gland-tipped hairs; leaves slender-petiolate, thin, ovate or lance-ovate, 4-7 cm. long, acuminate, rounded at the base, crenate, 5-nerved at the base, glabrate above, densely velutinous-pilose beneath with very short hairs; stipules setaceous; flowers monoecious, the spikes axillary, unisexual, short- pedunculate; pistillate spikes laxly flowered, the bracts 3 mm. long, 5 mm. broad, reniform, about 2-flowered, rounded-obtuse, densely glandular-puberulent, shal- lowly 9-13-dentate, the teeth triangular, acute; ovary somewhat muricate, pubes- cent; styles pectinately 6-9-lacinulate; seeds minutely foveolate-puncticulate. The available material of this species is scant, and the proper position of the single Guatemalan collection is somewhat uncertain. Acalypha leptopoda Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34: 39. 1865. A slender shrub 1-3.5 meters high, the indument of the stems and leaves variable; leaves on petioles 1-6 cm. long, membranaceous or thick-membranaceous and rather rigid, lance-ovate to broadly ovate, mostly 4-10 cm. long, acuminate or long-acuminate, rounded or shallowly cordate at the base, serrate, the young 38 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 leaves pubescent on both surfaces, 3-nerved at the base, penninerved above the base; stipules 5-10 mm. long, subulate-filiform; flowers monoecious, the spikes axillary, the staminate ones 3-6 cm. long, pedunculate, dense; pistillate spikes consisting of 1 or 2 bracts, borne on a very slender peduncle 2-3.5 cm. long; fruit- ing bracts about 8 mm. broad, 1-flowered, orbicular, incised-dentate almost to the base, the 13-17 teeth lanceolate, acute, sometimes sparsely and minutely stipitate- glandular; ovary pubescent; styles pectinately multilacinulate; capsule slightly muricate; seeds 1.5 mm. long, puncticulate. The species as treated by most authors consists of the two following varieties: Acalypha leptopoda var. glabrescens Muell. Arg. in DC. Prodr. 15, pt. 2: 824. 1866. A. Lotsyi Donn. Smith, Bot. Gaz. 20: 544. 1895 (type from Pansamala, Alta Verapaz, Tuerckheim 1242). Tejedor; Lolosan, Loasdm (Alta Verapaz, Quecchi); Canilla de venado. Dry to wet thickets or rather thin forest, sometimes in pine forest, 2,100 meters or less; Alta Verapaz; Baja Verapaz; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Guatemala; Sacatepe"quez; Chimal- tenango; Retalhuleu; Quezaltenango; San Marcos; Huehuetenango. Southern Mexico; Honduras and Salvador to Panama. Leaves and stems glabrate, or the leaves often quite glabrous at maturity. Around Coban the plant is used commonly in domestic medicine, as a lotion for treating burns, infected cuts, and various skin affec- tions, and as a shampoo for the hair. Acalypha leptopoda var. mollis Muell. Arg. in DC. Prodr. 15, pt. 2: 824. 1866. Bisic (Coban, Quecchi). Dry to wet thickets, often in open or dense, moist or wet forest, 600-2,300 meters; Alta Verapaz; El Progreso; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Guatemala; Quiche"; Huehuetenango. Southern Mexico; Honduras; Costa Rica. Leaves densely velutinous-pilose, especially beneath, the pubescence persistent in age. The two varieties probably are not systematically important, although the plants differ visibly in appearance. They do not have distinctive ranges in Guatemala. Acalypha macrostachya Jacq. PI. Hort. Schoenbr. 2: 63. pi. 245. 1797. A stout shrub 1-4.5 meters high, variable in pubescence, the branches usually thick and with large pith; leaves membranaceous, on petioles 5-25 cm. long, ovate to broadly ovate or triangular-ovate, 10-25 cm. long, 6-18 cm. wide, usually STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 39 abruptly acuminate or caudate-acuminate, rounded and often cordate at the base, serrate, palmate-nerved; stipules 1-1.5 cm. long, linear-lanceolate from an ovate base, glandular-ciliate, persistent; flowers monoecious or perhaps sometimes dioecious; spikes axillary, as much as 40 cm. long, sessile or short-pedunculate; staminate spikes dense, up to 5 mm. in diameter; pistillate spikes dense or lax, sometimes with staminate flowers at the apex; pistillate bracts very numerous, broadly ovate, shallowly 13-27-dentate, 1-flowered, the teeth triangular, acuminate, in fruit 5-7 mm. wide; ovary hispid, the styles purple-red, 10-20-lacinulate; capsule almost 4 mm. broad, pilose; seeds 2 mm. long, minutely puncticulate. The species, as treated by Pax and Hoffmann, includes the follow- ing varieties, separated on the basis of pubescence, and not sharply separable. Still another variety is reported by the same authors from Peru and Bolivia. Acalypha macrostachya var. hirsutissima (Willd.) Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34: 11. 1865. A. hirsutissima Willd. Sp. PI. 4: 528. 1805. A. sidaefolia HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 2: 95. 1817. A. macro- stachya var. sidaefolia Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34: 11. 1865. Comida de venado (Quezaltenango) ; Chichicaste de agua (fide Aguilar); Chi- chicaste (Santa Rosa; probably an erroneous name); Sesic (Que- cchi). Wet to dry, brushy hillsides or ravines or moist or wet forest, 2,000 meters or less, most frequent at about 1,000 meters; Alta Verapaz; Baja Verapaz; Izabal; Santa Rosa; Escuintla; Guatemala; Huehuetenango; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Southern Mexico; British Honduras; Honduras and Salvador to Panama; tropical South America. Young branches and petioles usually very densely pilose; leaves densely velutinous-pilose on the lower surface, the pubescence persistent in age. Sometimes called "shuampa" in Salvador. This has been re- ported from Guatemala as A. caucana Muell. Arg., a South American species. Both these varieties have approximately the same distribu- tion in Guatemala and are of apparently little or no taxonomic importance. Acalypha macrostachya var. macrophylla (HBK.) Muell. Arg. in Mart. Fl. Bras. 11, pt. 2: 345. 1874. A. macrophylla HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 2: 96. 1817. Moist or wet thickets or rather open, mixed forest, often on steep rocky hillsides, 250-1,500 meters; Alta Verapaz; Santa Rosa; Escuintla; Sacatepe"quez; Chimaltenango; Suchitepe'quez ; Retal- huleu; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Honduras to Panama; tropical South America. 40 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 Branches and petioles sparsely or rather densely hirsute or pubescent; leaves in age glabrate except on the nerves. Acalypha mollis HBK. Nov. Gen. & Sp. 2: 94. 1817. At 1,200-1,500 meters; Baja Verapaz (Panzal); Guatemala. Southern Mexico. A shrub, the branches stout, densely velutinous-pilose; leaves membranaceous, on slender petioles 1-4 cm. long, broadly ovate to lance-ovate, mostly 7-11 cm. long, narrowly long-acuminate or cuspidate-acuminate, rounded or very obtuse at the base, serrate-dentate, 5-nerved at the base, usually very densely soft-pilose, especially beneath; flowers monoecious, the staminate spikes axillary, 3-5 cm. long, 2-3 mm. thick, pedunculate, very dense; pistillate spikes terminal and in the axils of the uppermost leaves, pedunculate, very dense, 1 cm. thick, short or usually much elongate; pistillate bracts reniform-ovate, 11-15-dentate, 2-3- flowered; ovary villous-pubescent; styles 8-12-lacinulate. Acalypha Mortoniana Lundell, Bull. Torrey Club 64: 552. 1937. Limestone thickets or open forest, 300 meters or less; Pete"n (type from Uaxactun, H. H. Bartlett 12740). British Honduras. A shrub of 1.5-4 meters, the branchlets thick, pubescent with mostly sub- appressed, ochraceous hairs; stipules setaceous, 5 mm. long; leaves on slender petioles 11 cm. long or less, membranaceous, ovate or elliptic-ovate, 10-25 cm. long, 4-13 cm. wide, acuminate, rounded and usually shallowly and narrowly cordate at the base, coarsely crenate, palmately 5-nerved, at first finely velutinous- pubescent on both surfaces, glabrate in age; flowers monoecious, the staminate spikes axillary, 5-16 cm. long; pistillate spikes terminal, 10-12 cm. long, many- flowered, the bracts reniform-cordate, 5-6 mm. long, 6-8 mm. wide, very shallowly dentate, glandular-pilose, in fruit 9 mm. long and 16 mm. wide, with about 10 acute teeth; ovary sparsely hirsute; capsule 5 mm. long, very sparsely pilose or almost glabrous; seeds smooth, 4 mm. long. Acalypha persimilis Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34 : 25. 1865. Chum- pito. Moist thickets, dry rocky slopes, on sandbars along streams, or a weed in waste ground, 200-1,375 meters; Jalapa; Jutiapa; Santa Rosa; Escuintla; Huehuetenango. Southern Mexico; Greater Antilles. An erect annual, 50 cm. high or less, usually branched, sometimes simple, the stems densely pubescent at first; leaves membranaceous, on slender petioles 2-7 cm. long, ovate, 3-7 cm. long, 2.5-4.5 cm. wide, acute or short-acuminate, rounded and usually more or less cordate at the base, closely and finely serrulate, 5-nerved at the base, thinly pubescent when young, in age glabrate, puncticulate- scabrous; flowers monoecious, the staminate spikes axillary, 2 cm. long or less, slender-pedunculate; pistillate spikes terminal and in the upper leaf axils, the STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 41 terminal ones 3-4 cm. long, in fruit about 5 mm. thick, many-flowered, often lax; pistillate bracts reniform-orbicular, 4-5 mm. broad, rather shallowly 19-21-dentate, the teeth narrowly triangular, scabrous and sometimes pilose, 1-flowered; styles short, 3-4-lacinulate; capsule 3 mm. broad, papillose-hirtous; seeds 2 mm. long, rugose-tuberculate. Acalypha phleoides Cav. Icon. PL 6: 42. pi. 569, f. 2. 1801. Hierba del cancer; Hierba del est6mago (fide Aguilar). Usually in moist or dry, open, grassy, pine-oak forest, often in rocky places or in open fields or hillsides, 750-2,100 meters; Jalapa; Santa Rosa; Guatemala; Sacatepe"quez; Quiche"; Huehuetenango. Mexico. A perennial herb, usually from a thick woody root, the stems 50 cm. long or less, often numerous, erect to procumbent, puberulent or hirsute, little branched; petioles mostly less than 1 cm. long; leaf blades ovate or elliptic, 2-4 cm. long, 1-3 cm. wide, acute or obtuse, usually obtuse at the base, crenate-serrate, generally very finely so, 3-5-nerved, pilose or glabrate, punctate-scabrous; spikes andro- gynous, terminal and axillary, staminate above, or the axillary spikes often wholly staminate; terminal spikes 2-9 cm. long, the pistillate portion usually dense; pistillate bracts 1-2-flowered, suborbicular, 6-8 mm. long, coarsely 5-7- dentate, the teeth broadly triangular, acute, hispidulous or pubescent; ovary hirsute above, the styles purple-red, 6-8-lacinulate; capsule 2 mm. long; seeds subglobose, 1.5-2 mm. long, fuscous in age. Acalypha Poiretii Spreng. Syst. 3: 879. 1826. A. yucatanensis Millsp. Field Mus. Bot. 1: 371. 1898. Moist thickets, 200-500 meters; reported by Pax and Hoffmann as collected in Guatemala by Friedrichsthal, the locality not in- dicated. Southern Mexico; tropical South America. An erect annual, generally 50 cm. high or less, slender, branched, the stems hirsute or pilose; leaves thin, on slender petioles 4 cm. long or shorter, rhombic- ovate to oblong-ovate, 3-6 cm. long, acute or acuminate, rounded at the base, crenate-serrate, thinly or densely pilose with soft spreading hairs; spikes andro- gynous, terminal and axillary, the upper ones very dense, oblong, chiefly pistillate, the staminate portion very small and hidden among the pistillate bracts, the lower spikes staminate, with 1-2 pistillate bracts at the base; pistillate bracts 7 mm. broad, 7-9-fid for one-fifth their length, 1-flowered, densely pilose or hirsute; styles simple; capsule 2 mm. broad, hirsute and tuberculate near the apex; seeds narrowly ovoid, foveolate-puncticulate. Acalypha polystachya Jacq. PI. Hort. Schoenbr. 2: 64. pi. 246. 1797. A. Matudai Lundell, Contr. Univ. Mich. Herb. 4: 10. 1940 (type from Chiapas). Moist thickets or fields, sometimes on sandbars along streams, or a weed in cultivated ground, 400 meters or less; Zacapa; Suchi- tepe"quez; San Marcos; Huehuetenango. Mexico; Costa Rica. 42 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 An erect annual, the stems somewhat succulent, a meter high or less, stout, mostly simple, often fistulous, puberulent when young; leaves on very slender petioles 4-12 cm. long, thin, ovate or broadly ovate, about 10 cm. long and 6-9 cm. wide or often smaller, acute or abruptly short-acuminate, broadly rounded at the base, finely and closely serrate, thinly pilose on the upper surface or glabrate, somewhat paler beneath, glabrate, punctate, palmately 3-5-nerved; flowers monoecious, the staminate spikes axillary, 4 cm. long or less, slender, dense; pistillate spikes mostly terminal, in fruit as much as 15 cm. long and 1 cm. broad, dense or often interrupted below; pistillate bracts 9-11-parted nearly to the base, the segments almost setaceous, sparsely stipitate-glandular, 1-flowered, in fruit 1 cm. long; ovary glabrous, the styles 2-4-fid; capsule 4-5 mm. in diameter; seeds ovoid, almost 3 mm. long, acute, scrobiculate-roughened. Called "equilite" in Veracruz. It is reported from Chiapas that the plant is sometimes eaten, presumably as a pot herb. Acalypha pseudoalopecuroides Pax & Hoffm. Pflanzenreich IV. 147, xvi: 86. 1924. Moist brushy slopes or in quebradas, 200-500 meters; Zacapa. Southern Mexico; Honduras. Plants annual, 50 cm. high or less, erect, usually with numerous spreading branches, the stems densely pilose and glandular-hirsute, often villous at the base; leaves on slender petioles 1-2 cm. long, thin, ovate or broadly ovate, 2-4.5 cm. long, 1.5-3 cm. wide, acute or acuminate, rounded and often shallowly cordate at the base, crenate, 5-nerved at the base, sparsely or densely long-pilose on both surfaces, glabrate in age, puncticulate, usually more or less glandular-pilose; flowers monoe- cious, the staminate spikes terminal, 1 cm. long, slender, pedunculate; pistillate spikes axillary, 1.5-2.5 cm. long, 1 cm. broad, pedunculate, very dense, usually unisexual, many-flowered; pistillate bracts shallowly about 7-dentate, the teeth acute, densely glandular-pilose; ovary long-pilose, the style short, simple; capsule pubescent, 2.5 mm. broad; seeds 1.5 mm. long. This has been reported from Honduras as A. Poiretii Spreng. Although A. Poiretii and A. pseudoalopecuroides are placed far apart in their monograph by Pax and Hoffmann, because of the disposition of the inflorescences, the two plants are almost exactly alike in general appearance. Acalypha Schiedeana Schlecht. Linnaea 7: 384. 1832. Moist or dry thickets on hillsides or along streams, often in rocky places, 200-1,350 meters; Zacapa; Chiquimula; Jalapa; Baja Verapaz; Guatemala; Huehuetenango. Southern Mexico. A slender, much-branched shrub 1-3 meters high, the branchlets densely pubescent or glabrate; leaves thin, on slender petioles 1-5 cm. long, broadly ovate to lance-ovate, 5-13 cm. long, acute or acuminate, often abruptly so, usually rounded at the base and often cordate, crenate-dentate, varying from densely and softly pubescent to almost glabrous, 3-5-nerved at the base; stipules setaceous, STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 43 1 cm. long or less; staminate spikes axillary, 3 cm. long or less, slender, subsessile, dense; pistillate spikes terminal, pedunculate, 3-10 cm. long, usually dense and many-flowered; fruiting bracts 5-10 mm. broad, truncate, 7-11-dentate, the teeth triangular or lanceolate, acute, 1-flowered, pubescent and stipitate-glandular, sometimes glabrate; ovary hirsute, muricate; styles 5-10-lacinulate; capsule 3 mm. broad; seeds broadly ovoid, 1.5-2 mm. long. Acalypha septemloba Muell. Arg. was described from Guatemala on the basis of Friedrichsthal 1354, and is reported from the same country by Pax and Hoffmann. The type actually came, according to the original label, from Cartago, Costa Rica. Acalypha setosa A. Rich, in Sagra, Hist. Cuba 3: 204. 1850. Corrimiento (Pete*n). Moist or wet thickets, often a weed in waste ground or in fields, 900 meters or less; Pete"n; Alta Verapaz; Zacapa; Santa Rosa; Escuintla; Solola. Southern Mexico; British Honduras; Honduras; West Indies; northwestern South America. An erect annual, usually 75 cm. high or less, simple or sparsely branched, the young stems puberulent or pilose; leaves thin, on slender petioles 2-7 cm. long, ovate or broadly ovate, 3-10 cm. long, acute or abruptly short-acuminate, obtuse or rounded at the base and often shallowly cordate, finely and closely serrulate, 3-5-nerved at the base, thinly pilose or hirsute when young but in age glabrate, rough-puncticulate; flowers monoecious, the staminate spikes axillary, short, about 1 cm. long, pedunculate; pistillate spikes terminal and in the uppermost leaf axils, the terminal ones 3-6 cm. long, dense or lax and interrupted, in fruit 5 mm. broad; fruiting bracts 5-6 mm. long, 7-13-parted almost to the base, 1-flowered, scaberulous, the lobes setaceous-filiform, eglandular; ovary hirtellous, the styles 4-6-lacinulate; capsule 2 mm. broad, pilose; seeds 1 mm. long, smooth. Called "gusanillo" and "tarco" in Salvador. Acalypha Skutchii I. M. Johnston, Journ. Arnold Arb. 19: 120. 1938. Oreja de venado. Moist or wet, mixed forest, mostly in quebradas, 1,200-2,000 meters; Quezaltenango (type from Volcan de Zunil, A. F. Skutch 981); San Marcos. Oaxaca; Chiapas. A simple or branched shrub or small tree, 1.5-6 meters high, the branches stout, strigillose or glabrate; leaves mostly on very long, slender petioles, these often 15 cm. long; leaf blades oblong to lanceolate or broadly ovate, 10-20 cm. long, 3-12 cm. wide, abruptly acuminate or long-acuminate, narrowly obtuse to broadly rounded at the base, crenate-serrate, strigillose when young but in age almost wholly glabrous, slightly paler beneath, penninerved or rather conspicuously 3-nerved at the base, the lateral nerves 7-10 pairs; stipules 10-18 mm. long; spikes unisexual, the pistillate ones terminal, with a very stout rachis, 10-20 cm. long, short-pedunculate, the bracts rather distant, strigillose, in fruit 3-5 mm. 44 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 long, deeply 7-11-lobate; styles purple-red, lacinulate; ovary strigose; capsule 5-6 mm. broad. This shrub is a common one in many of the damp quebradas in the mountains of the Occidente. The leaves exhibit a good deal of variation in outline and venation, so much so that two species may be represented, but the inflorescences seem to be uniform in the several forms. Closely related to this species is A. laxiflora Muell. Arg., which is reported from Veracruz and Cuba. While very similar in foliage and other characters to A. Skutchii, it seems essen- tially different (according to a photograph of the type) in its slender flexuous staminate spikes. Acalypha subviscida Wats. Proc. Amer. Acad. 21: 440. 1886. Mostly in pine-oak forest, 1,900-2,050 meters; Chimaltenango; Huehuetenango. Mexico. An erect or suberect perennial, herbaceous throughout or sometimes suffrutes- cent below, simple or branched, usually much less than a meter high but sometimes as much as 1.5 meters, the stems densely pubescent and stipitate-glandular; leaves on slender petioles 1-6 cm. long, broadly ovate to lance-ovate, thin, 3-9 cm. long, acuminate, rounded and usually somewhat cordate at the base, crenate, palmate-nerved at the base, thinly or densely and softly pubescent, usually stipi- tate-glandular beneath on the nerves; flowers monoecious, the terminal spikes androgynous or wholly pistillate, 15 cm. long or less, dense, sessile; axillary spikes staminate or pistillate or androgynous, solitary or 2-3-nate, the staminate some- times 9 cm. long, slender, dense, the pistillate ones 5-7 cm. long; pistillate bracts rather lax, in fruit 6-8 mm. broad, reniform, 8-15-crenate, densely pubescent and stipitate-glandular, 2-4-flowered; styles subpalmately 3-7-lacinulate; capsule 2 mm. broad, pubescent, stipitate-glandular, muricate; seeds 1 mm. long, blackish gray, almost smooth. Acalypha tenuicauda Pax & Hoffm. Pflanzenreich IV. 147, xvi: 149. 1924. Moist or wet thickets or mixed forest, often in second growth, 700-2,000 meters; Escuintla (type from Los Diamantes, Barranco del Cucunya, Seler 2508); Suchitepe"quez; Solola; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Chiapas. A slender shrub 1-4.5 meters high, the branchlets fulvescent-pilose or tomen- tulose at first, soon glabrate; leaves on slender petioles 6-16 cm. long, thin, ovate to rounded-ovate or elliptic-ovate, mostly 10-20 cm. long and 6-15 cm. wide, long-acuminate or caudate-acuminate, obtuse to rounded and subcordate at the base, closely and finely serrate, palmate-nerved at the base, thinly pilose or hirsute or almost glabrous; stipules 8-12 mm. long, triangular-lanceolate, subulate- acuminate, sparsely stipitate-glandular on the margins; flowers monoecious, the spikes axillary, the staminate 5-6 cm. long, short-pedunculate, dense, many- STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 45 flowered, 2-3 mm. thick; pistillate spikes slender-pedunculate, often 15 cm. long, dense or usually lax, sparsely pilose; bracts in fruit about 3 mm. long and 6 mm. broad or somewhat larger, broadly reniform, subemarginate at the apex, shallowly about 11-dentate, sparsely stipitate-glandular, the teeth triangular-lanceolate, acuminate; styles pinnately 10-15-lacinulate; capsule 2 mm. broad, verrucose, sparsely pilose. A. tacanensis Lundell (Contr. Univ. Mich. Herb. 4: 11. 1940), described from Volcan de Tacana, Chiapas, is probably a synonym of this species, although we have seen no material of it. It is described as having larger pistillate bracts, as much as 6.5 mm. long. Acalypha trachyloba Muell. Arg. Flora 55: 25. 1872. Moist or wet, mixed or oak, usually dense forest, or in moist or wet thickets, 1,800-3,100 meters; Guatemala; Sacatepe"quez; Chimal- tenango; Solola; Huehuetenango; Quezaltenango; San Marcos. Southern Mexico. A slender shrub, commonly 1-3 meters high, erect or often more elongate and subscandent, the young branches densely fulvescent-pilose; leaves thin, on slender petioles 1-5 cm. long, broadly ovate or elliptic-ovate, mostly 5-14 cm. long, usually caudate-acuminate, rounded and often shallowly cordate at the base, coarsely crenate-dentate, villous-pubescent on both surfaces, often very densely so, espe- cially beneath, or in age sometimes glabrate, 5-nerved at the base; stipules 5 mm. long, linear, reflexed; flowers monoecious, the spikes axillary, the staminate slender, 7-11 cm. long, sessile or subsessile, dense, tomentulose; pistillate spikes very short in anthesis, borne on long slender peduncles, in fruit 1.5-3 cm. long, very dense, many-flowered, often as broad as long and head-like; fruiting bracts 1-1.5 cm. long, cleft almost to the base into 7-9 stiff, linear or subulate segments, these densely stipitate-glandular; ovary hirtellous and muricate; styles pilose, pecti- nately dissected; capsule 3 mm. in diameter, tuberculate, hispid; seeds smooth, almost 2 mm. long. A common shrub in the central and western highlands. Acalypha triloba Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34: 23. 1865. Hierba del cancer. At 2,500-2,900 meters; Huehuetenango (near San Juan A titan, Sierra de los Cuchumatanes, Steyermark 51959). Mexico(?). An erect perennial herb almost a meter high, simple or probably sometimes branched, densely hispid almost throughout with long spreading stiff hairs; leaves thin, on long slender petioles, ovate, 5-10 cm. long, acuminate, rounded at the base and often shallowly cordate, crenate-dentate, 3-nerved at the base; flowers monoecious, the spikes axillary and terminal, the staminate ones axillary, about 5.5 cm. long and borne on a peduncle of the same length, slender, interrupted below; pistillate spikes terminal and in the upper leaf axils, subsessile, 5-9 cm. long or shorter, very dense; fruiting bracts 2-3-flowered, 3-lobate to the middle or more deeply, long-ciliate, eglandular, the terminal lobe longer than the others, 46 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 triangular-lanceolate, acute, the lateral lobes subquadrate, truncate; ovary hirsute, the styles slender, 5-8-lacinulate, purple-red, showy, the central portion long- pilose; seeds foveolate-puncticulate. This species was described as coming from Mexico, but the labels of the type and other specimens do not indicate any definite locality. The Guatemalan collection cited was obtained in a region through which either Sesse" or Mocino or possibly both are known to have passed, and it is quite possible that the type was collected in Guatemala rather than Mexico. In general appearance this species is remarkably like some species of Urtica. Acalypha unibracteata Muell. Arg. Linnaea 34: 160. 1865. Tornillo (Pete"n). Moist or wet, mixed forest or in moist or dry thickets, 200-1,650 meters; Pete*n; Alta Verapaz; Baja Verapaz; Santa Rosa; Guate- mala; Sacatepe"quez. Southern Mexico; Salvador. A slender shrub 1-2 meters high, erect, the young branches fulvous-villosulous, in age brown or reddish brown; leaves thin or in age thick and firm, short-petiolate or the petioles sometimes slender and elongate, lance-ovate to lance-oblong, mostly 2-5 cm. long and 1-3 cm. wide, acuminate or narrowly long-acuminate, obtuse to cordate at the base, crenate-serrate, pilose when young but in age often glabrate, palmate-nerved; stipules small, setaceous-subulate; spikes axillary, unisexual, the staminate 1-1.5 cm. long, pedunculate, grayish-puberulent; pistillate spikes usually on very long, almost filiform peduncles, generally reduced to a single bract; pistillate bracts at anthesis 2 mm. wide, accrescent in age, 1-flowered, reniform- ovate, 9-11-laciniate to about the middle, the segments lanceolate; ovary slightly muricate, pubescent, the styles pectinately about 9-lacinulate. This and A. leptopoda are very closely related, and not always satisfactorily separable. Called "pie de paloma" in Salvador; "chilibtux" (Yucatan, Maya). In Yucatan the slender stout branches are utilized for making baskets and bird cages. Acalypha villosa Jacq. Sel. Stirp. Amer. 254. pi. 183, f. 61. 1763. A. flagellata Millsp. Field Mus. Bot. 2: 417. 1916 (type from Yucatan). Wet to rather dry thickets, frequently in second growth, often on limestone, 1,000 meters or less; Pete*n; Alta Verapaz; Santa Rosa; Guatemala; Quiche". Southern Mexico; British Honduras; Honduras; Salvador; Costa Rica; Panama; tropical South America. A shrub 1.5-4 meters high, sparsely branched, the young branches stout, sparsely or densely pubescent; leaves thin, on long slender petioles, ovate to broadly triangular-ovate, mostly 10-20 cm. long and 5-12 cm. wide, usually long- acuminate, generally rounded at the base, often subcordate, crenate, palmate- STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 47 nerved, sparsely or densely pilose or almost wholly glabrous; stipules subulate; flowers monoecious, but the branches often unisexual; staminate spikes 3-13 cm. long, dense, short-pedunculate, sometimes with a few pistillate flowers at the base, pubescent; pistillate spikes 3-11 cm. long or longer, very lax, usually simple, some- times branched, the rachis filiform, pubescent; pistillate bracts minute, with 2 or more flowers, these pedicellate; ovary strongly muricate, otherwise glabrous; styles short, 5-10-lacinulate; capsule 2.5 mm. in diameter, muricate; seeds sub- globose, smooth, scarcely 1 mm. long. Called "tapa-camino" in Veracruz. Acalypha Wilkesiana Muell. Arg. in DC. Prodr. 15, pt. 2: 817. 1866. Capa del rey; Pastor (Pet&i). Perhaps native of the southern Pacific region, now grown for ornament in most tropical and subtropical regions; planted very commonly in Guatemala, at low and middle elevations, most abundant in the lowlands. Usually a shrub of 1-3 meters, the young branchlets tomentulose or pilose, soon glabrate; leaves rather firm, on long slender petioles, broadly ovate, 10-20 cm. long, short-acuminate, broadly cuneate or very obtuse at the base, crenate- serrate, 5-nerved at the base, often lustrous, deep green with usually pink or pale red margins, often spotted with pink or dull red or purple; flowers monoecious, the spikes axillary; pistillate bracts 1-flowered, sparsely puberulent, 9-13-dentate; ovary puberulent; styles pectinately 11-15-lacinulate. Called "manto de Jesus" in Salvador. This is one of the most plentiful ornamental shrubs everywhere in the lowlands, thriving with little or no attention, and sometimes persisting around the sites of former dwellings. It is common in most of the cemeteries of the tierra caliente. It is used abundantly for hedges, especially those in the Pacific bocacosta enclosing coffee plantations. ADELIA L. Reference: F. Pax, Pflanzenreich IV. 147, vii: 64-71. 1914. Shrubs or small trees, pubescent or usually soon glabrate, the branchlets often spinescent; leaves alternate, sometimes crowded on the branchlets, mem- branaceous or chartaceous, entire, short-petiolate, penninerved, usually barbate beneath in the axils of the nerves, pellucid-pun cticulate; flowers dioecious, apetal- ous, small, axillary, the staminate short-pedicellate, the pistillate long-pedicellate; staminate calyx closed in bud, ovoid, in anthesis valvately 4-5-parted; stamens 8-17, free in bud, in age connate into a short or elongate column, the anthers versa- tile, dorsifixed near the base, the cells parallel, longitudinally dehiscent; extra- staminal disk usually annular, rarely of 5 glands; pistillate sepals 5-7, narrow, reflexed in anthesis, the disk annular, pubescent, adnate to the calyx; ovary generally 3-celled, the styles free or nearly so, laciniate; ovules 1 in each cell; capsule 3-lobate, pubescent, separating into 2-valvate cocci that separate from 48 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 a persistent central column, the endocarp crustaceous; seeds subglobose, smooth, gray, not carunculate; endosperm carnose, the cotyledons broad, flat. About 10 species, all American and chiefly in tropical America. Two others are known from southern Central America. Adelia barbinervis Schlecht. & Cham. Linnaea 6: 362. 1831. Moist or rather dry thickets or thin forest, sometimes in second growth thickets, 350 meters or less; Pete"n; Alta Verapaz; Izabal; Retalhuleu; Huehuetenango. Mexico; British Honduras; Salvador. A shrub or tree, sometimes 9 meters high, with a trunk as much as 20 cm. in diameter, the trunk round, short, the branches spreading, stiff and stout, the small ones often spinose, villosulous-pubescent or in age glabrous or nearly so; leaves on petioles 2-6 mm. long, obovate or obovate-lanceolate, mostly 4-9 cm. long and 2-3.5 cm. wide, cuspidate-acuminate to obtusely acute, narrowed below to a narrow subobtuse base or more often attenuate, chartaceous, deep green and glabrous above, penninerved, paler beneath, pubescent along the costa or at least barbate in the axils of the nerves, the lateral nerves 5-7 pairs; staminate flowers greenish or whitish, few or numerous in each axillary fascicle, the pedicels 3-7 mm. long, the pistillate pedicels 12 mm. long or in fruit as much as 2 cm. long, pubes- cent; staminate sepals 5, ovate-lanceolate, almost 2 mm. long, pubescent; stamens 8-11, the filaments pilose at the base; pistillate sepals 6-7, linear-lanceolate, acute, 2-3 mm. long; ovary densely hirsute; capsule pubescent, shallowly 3-lobate, the cocci somewhat carinate dorsally, 7 mm. long, 11 mm. broad; seeds globose, lustrous, 4 mm. in diameter. Known in Salvador by the names "tintorillo," "macaguite(?)," and "espino bianco"; "chau" (Yucatan, Maya). In the case of the Salvadorean name "macagiiite" and the statement that the pul- verized seeds are applied to the hair to make it soft and sleek, there is probably a confusion with Trichilia, which bears this name in Guatemala and is used for this purpose. The wood of A. barbinervis is said to be whitish throughout, slightly fragrant when fresh; probably no use is made of it unless as firewood. ALCHORNEA Swartz Reference: F. Pax, Pflanzenreich IV. 147, vii: 220-253. 1914. Shrubs or trees, the indument of simple or stellate hairs; leaves alternate, 2-stipulate, on long or short petioles, membranaceous or coriaceous, more or less dentate or subentire, usually with 2 glandular spots beneath at the base, penninerved or palmate-nerved; flowers apetalous, monoecious or dioecious, usually in unisexual spikes, these simple or paniculately branched, the staminate spikes commonly axillary, the pistillate terminal; staminate bracts several-flowered, the pistillate 1-3-flowered; staminate calyx globose in bud and closed; in anthesis valvately 2-5-parted; stamens 8 or rarely fewer, the filaments connate at the very base; anthers oblong, dorsifixed, the cells parallel, longitudinally dehiscent; STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 49 pistillate sepals 3-6, usually 4; ovary 2-3-celled, the styles free or short-connate, usually simple; ovules solitary in each cell; capsule 2-3-coccous or subglobose, the cocci 2-valvate, separating from the persistent central axis; seeds not caruncu- late, the endosperm carnose, the cotyledons broad, flat. Species about 45, widely dispersed in the tropics of both hemi- spheres. Two or three others are known in southern Central America. Leaves mostly 8-11 cm. long, entire or nearly so, those of sterile branches often crenate-serrate A. integrifolia. Leaves mostly 12-20 cm. long, all or most of them conspicuously crenate-dentate. A. latifolia. Alchornea integrifolia Pax & Hoffm. Pflanzenreich IV. 147, vii: 237. 1914. Wooded swamps, 1,400-1,500 meters; endemic; Alta Verapaz (type from Coban, Tuerckheim 103). A shrub or tree, sometimes 7 meters high, the branches with pale ochraceous bark, the young ones glabrous; leaves coriaceous, on petioles 1.5-4.5 cm. long, oblong or ovate-oblong, mostly 7-12 cm. long and 3-6 cm. wide, somewhat narrowed to the obtuse or rounded apex, obtuse or rounded at the base, entire or those of sterile branches sometimes crenate, glabrous above, almost glabrous beneath but with a few minute stellate hairs, with 2-4 glandular spots at the base, or these sometimes very obscure, 3-nerved at the base, the costa emitting 4-6 lateral nerves above the base; pistillate spikes 4-6 cm. long, solitary in the leaf axils, simple, the rachis minutely stellate-pubescent; bracts 1 mm. long, triangular, acute, 1-2-flowered, the flowers sessile, 2-bracteolate; sepals 4, ovate, acute, 2 mm. long, sparsely pilose, ciliate; ovary 2-3-celled, densely stellate-pilose; styles 2-3, short-connate, 5-9 mm. long. We have found this tree only in the large swamp east of Tactic, probably the type locality, where it is common, growing among or near the great sphagnum mounds. All the trees found were sterile. Alchornea latifolia Swartz, Prodr. Veg. Ind. Occ. 98. 1788. Carreton; Cajeton; Tern (Alta Verapaz). Moist or wet, mixed forest, sometimes on limestone, often abun- dant along steep slopes of barrancos, 1,400 meters or less; Peten; Alta Verapaz; Izabal; Jutiapa; Escuintla; Guatemala; Solola; Suchitepe"quez; Huehuetenango; Quezaltenango. Southern Mexico; British Honduras to Salvador and Costa Rica; West Indies. A tree, sometimes 20 meters high with a trunk 45 cm. or more in diameter, the crown rounded or irregular, the bark deep gray or light brown, the inner bark dark reddish, the branchlets minutely stellate-puberulent or almost glabrous; leaves subcoriaceous, on stout petioles 4-10 cm. long, ovate or elliptic, some- times very broadly ovate, mostly 12-25 cm. long and 6-18 cm. wide, abruptly short-acuminate to obtuse, generally obtuse or rounded at the base, crenate- 50 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 dentate, 3-nerved from the base, the costa emitting several lateral nerves above the base, glabrous above, 2-4-glandular beneath at the base, when young sparsely and very minutely stellate-puberulent beneath, often densely pubescent in the axils of the nerves; staminate spikes paniculate, slender, 7-20 cm. long, laxly many-flowered, the pistillate spikes simple or branched, 10-20 cm. long, solitary or geminate, the rachises minutely stellate-puberulent, the bracts triangular, acute, scarcely 1 mm. long, the staminate bracts 5-8-flowered, the pistillate 1-3-flowered; staminate flowers subsessile, 2-bracteolate, 4 mm. broad, the 2 sepals concave, ovate, acute, glabrous; stamens 8, connate at the base; pistillate sepals 4, ovate, acute, 1 mm. long; ovary usually 2-celled, sometimes 3-celled, puberulent; styles 6-20 mm. long; capsule 7 mm. high, 10 mm. broad, didymous, dark red or brown- red, glabrate; seeds echinate, 5 mm. in diameter. Called "canelito" in Honduras; "pochote," "pochoton," "tambor," "tepeachote" (Salvador); "carne de caballo" (Veracruz); "fiddle- wood" (British Honduras). The wood in this genus is pale brown, light, soft, and perishable. Little or no use is made of it in Guate- mala. Large trees often are left standing in the coffee plantations of the lower Pacific slopes. A probable synonym of this species is A. similis Muell. Arg., described from Oaxaca. We have seen type material, which seems to differ in no respect from the material we have referred here. Aleurites Fordii Hemsley, the Chinese wood-oil or tung-oil tree, and A. moluccana (L.) Willd., the candlenut or varnish tree, are sometimes planted in Guatemala, especially around the capital, as curiosities or for experimental purposes. The former has ovate- cordate, sometimes 3-lobate leaves, pubescence of simple hairs, and rather showy, pink or white flowers; the latter has large ovate- acuminate leaves, pubescence of stellate hairs, and white flowers. A. Fordii has been planted on a rather large scale along the Gulf coast of the United States for its abundant seeds, from which is obtained tung oil of commerce, used in preparation of paints and other manufactures. AMANOA Aublet Trees or shrubs, glabrous; leaves alternate, penninerved, coriaceous, entire, short-petiolate; stipules intrapetiolar, sometimes connate; flowers monoecious, petal- iferous, glomerate-fasciculate in the axils of leaves or bracts, minutely bracteate or the bracts sometimes rather large and foliaceous, sometimes arranged in strobili- form dichasia, the flowering branches sometimes simulating racemes or panicles; staminate sepals 5, subequal, firm, imbricate; petals 5, short, scale-like, unguiculate; disk extrastaminal, deeply lobate, sometimes small; stamens 5, inserted on a thick receptacle, episepalous, the filaments free, generally short, the anthers ovoid, introrse; ovary rudiment columnar, 3-lobate at the apex; pistillate sepals usually STANDLEY AND STEYERMARK: FLORA OF GUATEMALA 51 narrower than the staminate ones; ovary subglobose, 3-celled, the 3 stigmas sessile, carnose, disk-like; ovules geminate in each cell; capsule drupe-like, indurate in age, often muriculate, separating into 2-valvate cocci, 3-seeded or by abortion 2-1-seeded; seeds smooth, emarginate at the base, not carunculate, the testa crustaceous; endosperm thin or none; cotyledons carnose, plane on the inner side, subtrigonous, the radicle short. Ten species, 3 of them African, the others in tropical America. Only one is known in continental North America. Amanoa potamophila Croizat, Amer. Midi. Nat. 29: 475. 1943. Moist or wet, mixed forest, at or little above sea level, often along stream banks; Izabal. British Honduras, the type from seacoast, Cattle Landing, British Honduras, W. A. Schipp 1204. A glabrous shrub or tree, sometimes 12 meters high with a trunk 25 cm. or more in diameter, the smaller branches light brownish or grayish, with large leaf scars; leaves coriaceous, on petioles 1 cm. long or usually shorter, elliptic-oblong to obovate-oblong or elliptic, 6-19 cm. long, 3-8 cm. wide, narrowed to an obtuse apex or abruptly obtuse-acuminate, rounded to broadly cuneate at the base, entire, with about 10 pairs of lateral nerves; inflorescences spike-like, as much as 9 cm. long, often leafy, the flowers sessile, subtended by rather large, coriaceous, ovate bracts; pistillate buds broadly ovoid, 4-5 mm. long; pistillate sepals coriaceous, oblong-ovate, 6 mm. long, obtuse; fruiting pedicels thick and ligneous, about 1 cm. long; columella stout, angulate, 1.5 cm. long, the valves of the capsule ligneous, 2 cm. long, 2-3 mm. thick; seeds brownish-marmorate, smooth, lustrous, broadly somewhat obcordate, about 14 mm. long and 11 mm. broad, the large hilum sub- central. Called "swamp icaco" in British Honduras. This has been re- ported from the region as A. grandiflora Muell. Arg., a closely related species of northern South America, which seems to differ constantly in its considerably larger seeds. Croizat states that A. potamophila "amply differs from this (A. grandiflora) and other species of the genus in the range and several characters, such as the length of the pedicel, the thickness of the epicarp and the size of the seed." "Different range" is scarcely a specific character, in spite of the fact that it is often invoked to bolster species of weak characters; of the other characters the only one that holds is the size and form of the seed, but this does seem to be a constant and probably valid difference. The wood in this genus is reddish to purplish brown, moderately or very dense, and difficult to work. In the Amazon region it is sometimes used for heavy and durable construction. ASTROCASIA Robinson & Millspaugh Slender shrubs or small trees, glabrous or nearly so; leaves on long slender petioles, membranaceous, alternate, entire; flowers small, dioecious, petaliferous, 52 FIELDIANA: BOTANY, VOLUME 24 fasciculate in the leaf axils, on long filiform pedicels; staminate sepals 5, imbricate, widely spreading in anthesis, the petals erect or ascending; disk cupular, 5-crenate; stamens 10, the filaments connate into a slender column, this expanded at the apex into a disk, the anthers ellipsoid, sessile, horizontally dehiscent; ovary rudi- ment none; fruit capsular, 3-coccous, shallowly 3-sulcate, elastically dehiscent; seeds pale dull brownish, irregular trigonous-globose, smooth, not strophiolate. Two other species have been described from Mexico. Astrocasia phyllanthoides Rob. & Millsp. Bot. Jahrb. 36, Beibl. 80: 20. 1905. Chinchin (Pet