ALBERT

Description: Annual or perennial herbs or shrubs, often fleshy, glabrous, papillate or hairy. Leaves opposite or alternate, exstipulate, sometimes seemingly wanting, stalked or sessile, entire, dentate-serrate-lobed or irregularly gashed. Flowers solitary, 2—3-nate or glomerate, usually sessile, either axillary or in terminal or axillary dense or interrupted spikes or panicles, ♀ or unisexual, monochlamydous, rarely achlamydous, small; bracts present or absent, usually small, rarely leafy. Perianth herbaceous or sometimes scarious, rarely (in ♀) absent, 3—5-partite with (in bud) imbricate segments, or sometimes almost entirely gamophyllous and then shortly lacerate-dentate or unilaterally cleft, persistent, after anthesis accrescent or not. Stamens often the same number as tepals and opposite to them, sometimes fewer, usually inserted on or near base of perianth; filaments free or shortly connate; anthers dorsifixed or inserted in a basal cleft, 2-celled (4-locellate); cells bursting longitudinally. Ovary free or at the base adnate to the perianth, 1-celled; ovule 1, basal, sessile and erect or suspended from a funicle; styles or stigmas 2-5, linear. Utricle either enclosed by the perianth or not, indehiscent or rarely operculate; seed erect, oblique or horizontal, usually compressed; endosperm mostly present, peripheral, surrounding the embryo; embryo annular or spirally twisted. Distr. Species numerous, inhabitants of the temperate and tropical zones of both hemispheres.

Description: Delicate, annual or perennial herbs, aquatic and then either entirely submersed, or floating in the upper part, or, in humid localities, not rarely terrestrial and creeping, with slender stems. Leaves opposite, at the summits of floating stems often spuriously rosulate, exstipulate, small, linear, elliptic, oblong or spathulate, entire, herbaceous, in the Mal. sp. triplenerved. Flowers minute, unisexual, axillary, solitary or rarely one ♂ and one ♀ flower from the same axil, often with 2 caducous, transversal, opposite, tender concave bracts. Calyx and corolla absent, ♂: Stamen 1; filament thin, anther 2-celled, cells bursting lengthwise, the slits becoming confluent at the top. ♀: Ovary sessile or subsessile, 4-lobed, 4-celled. Ovule solitary in each cell, pendulous from the top of the cavity. Styles 2, free, often long, papillose. Fruit 4-lobed, with longitudinally margined or winged lobes. Testa membranous; endosperm fleshy; embryo terete, straight. Distr. Only genus in the family, worldwide distributed, not yet known from S. Africa and in various regions scarce, in Malaysia apparently very rare, the only record proving its being indigenous is from the New Guinean highlands. Because of their small size terrestrial forms are easily overlooked.

Description: Annual or perennial, unarmed or spinous, bitter herbs or undershrubs, often glandular-hairy. Stem terete, farctate, with a peripheral whorl of air-vessels. Leaves spread, simple, entire, exstipulate. Flowers ♀, actinomorphic, solitary, opposite or between the leaves, or by stunting of the leaves, more or less arranged in a racemiform or paniculiform inflorescence, distinctly pedicelled, lilac blue. Calyx persistent, 5-partite to near the base, segments lanceolate, imbricate in bud, after anthesis not or hardly accrescent. Corolla gamopetalous, deeply 5-partite; limb rotate; segments imbricate in bud, oval, obtuse. Stamens 5, free, inserted in the throat of the corolla, alternating with the segments; filaments filiform from a broadened base, glabrous or papillate; anthers 2-celled, bifid at the base and apex, opening lengthwise. Disk absent. Ovary superior, 2- (rarely 3-, very rarely more-) celled; placentas adnate to the dissepiment, spongy, entire or in cross-section bifid; styles 2 (rarely 3 or more), free; stigmas capitate-clavate. Ovules ~. Capsule globose or ellipsoid, loculicid, or both loculicid and septicid, 2(rarely more)-valved, or bursting irregularly. Seeds ~, very small, longitudinally ribbed; endosperm small, straight. Distr. Species ± 20, in the tropics of both hemispheres; in Malaysia 2, of which one indigenous, the other introduced and naturalized in Java.

Description: Halophobous, aquatic or palustrial perennial herbs, rooting in the mud or freefloating. Stem erect or floating, solid, with numerous air-chambers as are the petioles. Leaves rosulate or alternate, or solitary at the top of the stem, emersed, floating or submerged, broad or narrow, curvinerved (when emersed); petioles sheathing at the base. Flowers ♀, ephemerous, mostly in racemiform, spiciform, subumbelliform or paniculiform inflorescences which are subtended by 1-2 spathelike or tubular leaf-sheaths, rarely solitary or pairwise in the leaf-axils. Bracts minute or absent. Flowers often simultaneously or centrifugally expanding. Perianth choriphyllous or gamophyllous, 6-merous, actinomorphic or zygomorphic, blue or lilac, rarely yellow, after anthesis marcescent and tightly including the ovary or the fruit. Stamens 6 or 3, rarely 1, on the base, in the tube or in the throat of the perianth, often unequal; filaments free; anthers 2-celled, cells bursting lengthwise, rarely opening by pores. Ovary superior, sessile, 3-celled, with axile placentas or 1-celled with 3 parietal or with 1 apical placenta. Ovules numerous or 1 and then pendulous from the apex of the cell. Style 1; stigma entire or minutely 3-lobed. Fruit a 3-valved capsule or indehiscent. Seed(s) longitudinally ribbed. Embryo central, terete, straight, hardly shorter than the copious, mealy endosperm. Distr. About 8 small genera and ± 25 species, 6 genera confined to the New World, one in Madagascar, one widely distributed in the Old World; in Malaysia one native genus, one introduced and abundantly naturalized, and one occasionally cultivated as an ornamental.

Description: Erect tall annual, usually branched. Leaves simple, with 2 free stipules, in the lower part of the stem opposite, in the higher part spirally arranged, long-petioled, palmate, 3—11-foliolate. Flowers (♂) (♀) or mostly (♂♀). Male flowers in short, dense cymes, which are united into lax, foliate, terminal panicles, very shortly pedicelled. Tepals 5, free, oblong, membranous, imbricate. Stamens 5, epitepalous; filaments erect and short in bud, linear, with a narrowed apex; anthers comparatively large, basifixed, 2-celled, cells opening longitudinally, rudimentary ovary absent. Female flowers solitary in the axil of a small, primary, membranous, entire bract closely enveloping the ovary, each enveloped by a spathaceous, conspicuous, acuminate, secondary bract. Perianth absent. Ovary sessile, 1-celled; style central; stigmas 2, sessile, long, filiform, caducous. Ovule solitary, pendulous. Achene closely enveloped by the much enlarged, secondary bract, broadly oval, with a concave rimmed base, much compressed, faintly keeled on the lateral margins; pericarp smooth, hard, crustaceous, easily splitting into two halves; albumen unilateral, scanty, fleshy; embryo large, horseshoe-shaped; cotyledons large; radicle long. Distr. Monotypic, native of Central Asia, cultivated in tropical Asia, naturalized in N. America.

Description: Small trees or erect shrubs. Leaves spirally arranged, simple, petioled, entire, palmatinerved, densely red-dotted. Stipules small, very caducous. Flowers in terminal corymbs or panicles, actinomorphic, ♀, rather large. Pedicel with 5-6 apical glands. Sepals 4-5, free, imbricate in bud, falling off as soon as the flower expands. Petals 4-7, free, imbricate in bud. Stamens numerous, inserted on an annular hypogynous disk; filaments thin, free; anthers horseshoe-shaped, passing over the top of the filament and with both ends closely applied to i , 2-celled; cells opening in the middle (on the top of the filament) by short slits which unite into a spuriously apical pore. Ovary superior, usually bristly, 1-celled, with 2 opposite parietal slightly intruding placentas. Style 1, sinuous, rather thick; stigma 2-dentate. Ovules very numerous. Capsule compressed contrary to the placentas, usually softly prickly, rarely smooth, loculicidally bivalved; endocarp membranous, separating from the valves. Seeds numerous, obovoid, angular; testa fleshy, very densely studded with small, round, red, sessile glands; albumen well-developed, not oil-containing; embryo rather large. Distr. Monotypic, native and cultivated in tropical America; cultivated in many other tropical countries.

Description: According to general opinion the spikelets of Oryza consist, reckoned from their base upwards, of 2 sterile glumes, called hereafter I and II, one fertile glume (valvula inferior; lemma), called hereafter III, and the palea valvula superior) to this glume, called hereafter p3. The spikelets are placed singly on the very short ultimate branchlets, called hereafter pedicels, of a more or less strongly ramose panicle; the tips of the pedicels are broadened into a shallow infra-spicular cup, either distinctly 2-lobed or not; from the bottom of the cup arises a minute knob, on which the very distinct basal callus of the spikelet is jointed. When ripe, the spikelets of the wild species fall off as a whole, disarticulating at the joint (in dried specimens often long before maturity; hence in herbarium-specimens they are frequently lacking). In many cultivated forms they remain firmly attached to their pedicels, a property of very high economic value. The spikelets are strongly laterally compressed. I and II are either 1-nerved or nerveless; as a rule they are many times shorter than the spikelet, sometimes even very minute. Only in O. Ridleyi they are comparatively well-developed, reaching about half the length of the spikelet, but very narrow. III is very rigid, usually conspicuously granulate, boatshaped, keeled, either awned or not, 5-nerved, with a strong midrib; it has the ultimate lateral nerves along the margins. P3 is likewise boatshaped, shortly cuspidate or not, with a narrow, rather rounded, less often faintly keeled back, 3-nerved; it is about as long as III, awn disregarded, and has the same rigid granulate structure, excepted the narrowly incurved thinly membranaceous smooth marginal parts (hidden by III). It might be taken for a fertile glume, but this view is inadmissible because of the averted position of the lodicules. It has a rather thin mid-nerve and strong lateral nerves, separating the rigid central part from the membranaceous borders. The well-developed lodicules are glabrous; the six stamens are free; there are 2 free shortish styles with large plumose white or violet stigmas which, during anthesis, stick out from the sides of the spikelet in or below its middle. The ripe fruit is oblong or lanceolate, usually angular; it is free from glume and palea but remains firmly incarcerated between them.

Description: See for the confusion reigning about tho species of this genus Journal of the Arnold Arboretum VIII (1927), 234 seq. The only species cultivated in Java (not so much for its fruit as for its medicinal properties) is M. australis Poir. Formerly it went by the name of M. alba L. from which it differs i.a. by its shining dark-red or almost black fruits.

Description: As far as known at present there occur in Java 4 wild species of Gynura, viz. G. aurantiaca (B1.) DC., G. carnosula Z.M., G. densiflora Miq. and G. procumbens (Lour.) Merr. A fifth species. G. pseudochina (L.) DC., is met with as a cultivated plant only, and even as such it seems to be very rare. A sixth. G. crepidioides Bth., an African plant of recent introduction, is better placed in Crassocephalum. Only one of the wild species, G. procumbens, occurs throughout the island, from sea-level up to about 2100 m. altitude. G. aurantiaca is restricted to West- and Central-Java, where it is found between 750 and 2400 m. alt.; along watercourses, however, it occasionally descends¹ as low as 350 m.; its area of distribution, extending from Mount Gědè to Mount Wilis, slightly overlaps in its eastern part the western extremity of that of G. densiflora. — G. densiflora, though reported to have been found almost a century ago in West-Java, seems, at present at least, to be confined to the eastern half of the island. It is a true mountain plant, growing between 2000 and 2600 m. above sea-level; its area of distribution extends from Mount Lawu to Mount Idjèn. G. densifolia appears to be essentially a sea-shore species; it has been found only in the eastern half of Java along the southern coast.

Description: Herbs or undershrubs, usually succulent, perennial, less often annual or biennial. Leaves spirally arranged, opposite or whorled, exstipulate, simple or compound, entire, dentate, crenate, serrate or deeply incised. Flowers ♀, rarely unisexual, actinomorphic, usually cymose or cymose-paniculate, rarely spicate or solitary in leaf-axils, pedicelled or sessile, mostly 4—5-, rarely 3- or polymerous. Sepals free or nearly so, or united into a distinct tube, after anthesis marcescent and persistent as are the petals. Petals the same number as sepals, rarely more, hypogynous, free or variously connate. Stamens either as many as petals and alternate with them or twice their number, perigynous or all or partly inserted on the corolla; filaments free from each other; anthers 2-celled; cells introrse, dehiscing longitudinally. Hypogynous scales as many as carpels, placed singly at the back of them, free or at the base adnate to the base of the carpels. Carpels superior, the same number as petals, epipetalous, free or connate at the base, 1-celled. Ovules inserted on the adaxial side, mostly many, biseriate, rarely solitary or few. Styles as many as carpels, free, linear or subulate, short to long. Fruit follicular, membranous or leathery, opening on the adaxial side. Seeds minute, endosperm usually fleshy; embryo straight. Distr. About 20 genera and upwards of 700 spp., in the frigid, temperate and warm regions of Europe, Asia, Africa, northern and tropical America, rare in S. America and Australia, absent from Polynesia.