AISKAIS OF THE EOYAL BOTANIC GAEDEN, CALCUTTA.
loug, Straw-coloured, striate, ciliate on ono edge, truncate at top in a narrow ciliate
calbs and bearing short auriclcs furnished with few long purple bristles ; liffu/e long,
dark-coloured, ciliate. Ivjloresccneo usually on separate leafless culms, but sometimes with
flowers and leaves intermixed, branches many, fasuicled, drooping, paniculately racemose ;
rachis Tcry slender, much jointed, bearing at the joints papery, straw-colourcd, narrow
(•2 to -3 in.) sheaths 1-5 to 3 in. long, truncate or ending in a small leafy,
subulate, imperfect blade, which enclose 2 to 3 pedicellate (or one sessile) spikolcts.
Spikelets loose, compressed, 1 to 2-o in. long, bearing 2 empty glumes and 4 to
8 fertile (or the last imperfect) flowers; racliill® long-clavate, white hairy at tip;
empty glumes 2, linear-lanceolate; one rather blunt, short, the other long, mucronate,
membranous, striate, glabrous; flowering glumes ovate, long-acuminate, mucronate, -6 to
1 in. long, scabrous, striate; palca much shorter than flowering glume, 2-kccled, oiliate
on the keels, sometimes bifid, 1- to 2-nerved outside, 1-nerved between the keels.
Locliciiles 3, ovate-falcate or ovate-acute, 3—5-nerved, fimbriate. Stamens long es?erted,
anthers blunt. Ovary glabrous, ovoid, elongate, surmounted by a short style which at
once divides into 3 long, plumose, recurved stigmas. Caryopsis linear-oblong, glabrous,
furrowed on the back. Species Graminum iii. tab. 350; Rupreelit Baml. 24, tab. ii. fig. o;
Stexidel Stjn. 334; Brandis in Ind. Forester xii. 206. A. PROCEEA. Wall MS. in °IIerb.
Mus. BriL, fide Munro. THAMNOCALAJIUS SPATHIFLORUS, Mimro in Trms. Linn, Soc. xxvi. 34 •
Br-ndis For. Flora 563. "Genus novum Bamhisce affine,'" Wall. Cat. 6041. "I3A.MBUSA
MACRO—," "Wall. MS. in Herb. Kew.
Mountains of the North-West Himalaya from the Satlej to Nepal, above 7,000
feet, first collected in flower by WalHch in 1821, and since then by Brandis iu 1879 (?),
by W. R. Fisher in Jaunsar in 1882, and by myself at Deoban, 9,000 fx., in ISQi'
and on Kedarkanta in Tehri-Gai-hwal, 9,000 ft., iu 1893. '
This is the common high level ringal of tlio North-West Himalaya, common in
the undergrowth of the deodar and fir forests in moist localities. It usually flowers
gregariously as it did iu 1882 (see A. F. Broun in Ind. Forester, vol. xii. p. 414,
fig. 1), the seedlings from which flowering are now (1893) growing up. But isolated
old flowering clumps may be occasionally met with, such as those I found in 1892
and 1893. It is at once distinguished from A. f.dcata by its prominent transverse
veinlets; from A. Jaimsarensis by its short rhizomes and ca?spitoso growth; and from
A. arisiaia, (to which I refer all the Eastern Ilimalayan specimens hitherto assigned
to this, and which is very nearly allied to it,) by the narrower bracts with fewer
epikelets, the absence of a hairy callus to the leaf-sheath, and other minor points.
The culms are used for pipe-stems, basket-work, pea-sticks and other pui-poses.
PLATE NO. 1Q.—Arundinaria spathiflora, Trin. 1, leaf-branch; 2, flowering branch;
3, part of young shoot with c u l m - s h e a t h — i i s e ; 4, c u l m - s h c a t h — i o -i;
5, leaf-sheath—mwe/i enlarged; 6, spikelet and bract; 7 & 8, amply glumes; 9, flowering
glume; 10, palea; 11, lodicules; 12, anther; 13, ovary and stigmas; 14, transverse vcna°
tion of Uai—enlarged. (Nos. 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, from my own specimens, rest fi-om Wallich's
Nepal specimen.)
16. AEUNDINAEIA AEISTATA, n. sp. Gamlle,
A gregarious caspitose shrub. Culms strong, glaucous-grecn and white-scurfy at
first, afterwards a sbinmg yellow, 8 to 12 ft. high by -5 to '6 in. in diameter- nodes
INDIAN BAMBTJSEiE; GAMBLE. 10
not much swollen, but prominent on account of the persistent cup-like base of the
fallen sheath; internodes 8 to 12 in. long, walls hard, over '1 in. in thickness ;
branchlets veiy many from the nodes, either all flowering and all leaf-bearing, or bearing
both flowers and leaves together, joints short, reddish in colour, nodes prominent,
bearing straw-coloured loose diy sheaths. Culm-sheaths 6 to 8 in. long, 2-5 to 3 in.
broad at base, gradually attenuate upwards couvexly to a -3 iu. broad truncate point
which is slightly ciliate; base with a thick ring of soft haii-s, back sparsely coTCrod
with long bristles with bulbous bases; imperfect Hade 1 to l-o in. long, -1 to '2 in.
broad, subulate, hardly decurrent; Ugule short, minutely pubescent. Leaves in terminal
sets of 2 to 3, on much-jointed, loose-sheathed, purple branchlets, oblong-lanceolate,
attenuate at the base into a "2 in. loug glandular petiole, ending above iu a twisted
setaceous point; glabrous but roughish on both surfaces, or faintly Iiairy beneath,
scabrous on one edge ; main vein narrow, shining, carried into the petiole, secondary
veins 3 to 5 pairs, intermediate 5 to 7, transverse veinlets very prominent and regularly
tessellate; leaf-shcaths loose, striate, 2 to 3 in. long, keeled, ending cach side in a
thickened shaggy callus below the petiole, and produced upwards at the margin to
meet the ligule, and then bearing a few (6—8) long stiff purple bristles ; ligide long,
acute or truncate. Inflorescence of many paniculate racemes clustered at the nodes of
the culm, the joints of the branchlets bearing a large spathaceous bract enclosing 3 to 5
spikelets with short pedicels; rachis smooth, slender, jointed; bract 1'5 to 2 in. long
and -4 to -5 in. broad, reddish-brown or yellowish, ending in a fimbriate mouth and
bearing a leaf like imperfect blade. Spikelets 1 to 2 iu. long with 2' empty glumes
and 4 to 8 fertile flowers, compressed; rachillaj clavate, curved, minutely white
ciliate below the joint; empty glumes 2, pale, membranous, oblong-lanceolate, scabrous,
mucronate, keeled, o—7-nerved, glabrous ; flowering ghmes ovate, long acuminate, darkcoloured,
scabrous-hirsutc, prominently 9-nervcd; palea nearly as long as flowering
glumes, 2-keeled, minutely ciliate on the keels, ovate acuminate, usually binmcronate,
scabrous, 2-nei'ved between and 2-nerved on either side of the keels. Lodicules lanceolate,
acute, tliickencd below, 3-nerved, ciliate. Stamens esserted, anthers purple, blunt. Ooary
ovate, surmounted by a short style, speedily dividing into 3 feathery stigmas. Caryopsis
dark brown, linear-oblong, glabrous, furrowed on the back, acute. THAJINOCALAMUS
SPATHIFLOEUS, Munro in Trans. Linn. Soo. xxvi. 34 {partly).
North-Eastern Himalaya in Sikkim and British Bhutan, especially on the Singalila
Kauge above 10,000 ft.: collected iu flower by Kurz in 1868; by C. B. Clarke at
Yakla, 11,000 ft., in 1869; by C. G. Rogers at Tonglo, 10,000 f t . ; and by G. A. Gammie
at Phalut, 10,000 ft. in 1890. Leaf specimens have also been collccted by
H. C. Levinge, Kurz, G. King, myself and others in Sikkim, and above Chupcha in
woods at 9,500 to 10,000 ft. by Griffith in Bhutan.
This spccics comes very near to A. spathiflora^ but after careful examination of
several specimens I have come to the conclusion that it is specifically distinct, and that
all the East Himalayan specimens placcd by Munro under A. spathiflora belong to
J . aristata. It is a beautiful and interesting little bamboo, and differs in habit from
A. spathiflora also in having broader luacts, enclosing several spikelets, shorter leaves, a
hairy callus below the petiole which is longer, longer mucros to the flowering glumes,
and a more acuminate palea which is nearly as long as the flowering glume.
G. A. Gammie gives the name as Bhebham (Bhutia), Bahuin (Lepcha). On the hills
of Sikkim this species is easily recognized by the yellow culms and reddish branchlets.
AKS. EOY. BOX. GAUD, CAI,CIJ-JTA, TOL. Y l l .
yy,