Journal of the Federated Malay States museums - Sabrizain.org

152 Journal of the F.M.S. Museums. [Vol. VI,
thin nerves, 3 inches long, i inch across ; petiole ^ inch long,
the small leaf sessile, lanceolate-acuminate, f inch long, ^ inch
wide. Stipules ovate, obtuse. Flowers about 4 on a peduncle,
an inch long, with 4 stipuliform bracts about halfway up,
glabrous below, pubescent above the bracts. Floral bracts
linear, j^^ inch long. Pedicels ^ inch long, pubescent. Calyx
•campanulate, hairy, ^ inch long, the lobes lanceolate-acuminate,
nearly as long as the tube. Corolla white, half an inch cicross;
tube very short ; lobes 5, lanceolate-^icuminate, acute. Stamens
as long as the petals, lanceolate-acuminate, beaked.
In thick woods on the bank of the Teku River at about
4,600 feet altitude.
This is most nearly allied to A. Hookeri, King, but the
leaves are larger and more remote and the flowers are smaller.
*68. Akgostemma Yappii, King; Ridley, op. cit. p. 311.
Common in shady wet spots up to 7,100 feet elevation on
Gunong Tahan.
Distribution. Hills of the Malay Peninsula.
*69. Hedyotis patens, Ridl. op. cit. p. 311.
A very common plant from Wray's Camp, 3,300 feet
elevation, to the top of Gunong Tahan, in open places among
low bushes. The plant is very variable in size, tall with a
widely spreading panicle in the denser thickets by Wray's
Camp, short and more compact in leaf and panicle in the open
dry Padang. I never saw it creeping, as described by
Robinson. The petals are usually greenish white, occasionally
purplish, and when open are curled back so as to expose
the long projecting stamens. These are extended in a horizontal
direction, the two lower ones slightly longer than the
three upper ones. The anthers are purple. The flower opens
in the morning very early, and the petals curl back. The
stamens are projecting and the style is only § of the length of
the stamens. On the second da)^ the stamens are withered
and the style is now considerably longer than them and is projecting
horizontally. In the ordinary species of the genus the
short stamens hardly protrude their tips from the mouth of
the tube and the petals are not recurved, and they do not
appear to be visited by Hymenoptera. The structure of the
flower of Hedyotis patens appears to be unique in the genus.
The flowers, which are very inconspicuous, are visited and
regularly pollinated by a species of Bombus. This insect
spends the whole day, from shortly after sunrise to sunset, at
these flowers, almost to the exclusion of any other flower,
wherever the Hedyotis is abundant. I have, however, seen it
at work on Xyris grandis, Melastoma longisepala, and Bneckia.
It does not fly from one species to another, but confines its
attentions to the Hedyotis or Xyris as long as there are any in
the vicinity. In attacking the Hedyotis, it clings to the
branches of the cyme and inserts its proboscis above the
stamens, in such a way that the anthers brush the underside
of the abdomen. It visits also flowers in which the stamens