Cassiinae pt 1 NY-Botanical_gardens_Vol. 35_1 - Copy.pdf - Antbase

160 MEMOIRS OF THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN [VOL. 35
Mountain forest, disturbed woodland, thickets, and persisting at forest border
or in hedges, 50-850 m, Porto Rico (w., e.-centr. and e. districts). Virgin Is. (St.
Thomas and Tortola), and Leeward Is. (St. Kitts); ?Haiti, cf. discussion).—Fl.
VIII-II.
A close relative of S. quinquangulata and S. viminea, differing from both in
the loss of one or two of the abaxial set of stamens, and fully allopatric. Of ser.
Bacillares, S. bacillaris alone shares its insular range between Puerto Rico and
St. Kitts and this differs greariy in its strongly asymmetric, plane-margined leaf­
lets, zigzag primary inflorescence-axis, heptamerous androecium and thick-mar­
gined sutures of the pod. The fuUy expanded petals of S. nitida are ordinarily
longer in relarion to the smaU calyx than those of S. quinquangulata, the sepals
are more strongly veined in age, the fohage is on the average smaUer, the style
less dilated under the stigma, and the pod at once broader and shorter; but no
one of these differential characters can be rehed on absolutely to separate all
forms of S. quinquangulata, of which the pod, moreover, is stUl very poorly
known. The yet shorter pod is perhaps the best morphological character sepa­
rating S. viminea which, however, is in practice recognized as the only Jamaican
representative of this immediate alhance, further notable for its full set of seven
anthers. In describing Chamaefistula antillana Britton & Rose gave no diagnosis
whatever, but in North American Flora compared it with S. viminea; while their
contrast in the pods has proved a vahd one, that involving width of leaflets cannot
be confirmed in the material now available.
The two specimens of 5. nitida known to Bentham were referred by him (1971)
to Cassia quinquangulata, that of Masson from St. Kitts without comment, that
of Oersted from St. Thomas with a remark on its nearly glabrous foliage. The
correct application of the name C. nitida, which Bentham thought to have orig­
inated in French Guiana and guessed to be synonymous with C. viminea, was
first estabhshed by Amshoff (1939, I.e.).
A sterile specimen from Haiti (Massif des Matheux, 1500 m, 16.III.26, Ekman
5760, US) is highly suggestive of C. nitida, but could also represent an outlying
population of Jamaican C. viminea. We have seen no other Bacillares of this
type from Hispaniola.
29. Senna viminea (Linnaeus) Irwin & Barneby, comb. nov. Cassia viminea Lin­
naeus, Syst. Nat. ed. 10, 1016, 1759 Gun) & Pl. Jamaic. PugiU. 12. 1759
(dec, reprinted in Amoen. Acad. 5: 397. 1760), aU based on Cassia
No. 8 (viminea etc.) P. Browne, Civ. & Nat. Hist. Jam. 223. 1756.—
"... native of the coldest mountains of Linguanea . . . near Cold-
Spring [Hanover Parish]."—Holotypus, LINN 528.6\Scolodia vimi­
nea (Linnaeus) Rafinesque, Sylva TeU. 128. 1838. Chamaefistula vi­
minea (Linnaeus) Britton & Rose, N. Amer. Fl. 23(4): 232. 1930.
Cassia melanocarpa Bertero ex DeCandolle, Prod. 2: 491. 1825.—"in Jamaica. Bertero."—Holotypus,
labelled ''C. fruticescens Bertero ex Jamaica, herb. Berteroana misit Balbis 1822,"
G-DC\—Chamaefistula melanocarpa (DeCandolle) G. Don, Gen. Hist. Diehl. Pl. 2: 451.
1832.—Equated with C. viminea by Bentham, 1871, I.e.
Cassia fruticescens Bertero ex Sprengel, Syst. 2: 335. 1825.—''Jamaica.''—No typus known to
survive, but on circumstantial evidence based on an isotypus of the preceding.
Chamaefistula tocotana Rose ex Britton & Killip, Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 35(3): 174. 1936.—
"Cuesta de Tocota, road from Buenaventura to Call, El Valle, Colombia, December, 1905,
Pittier 720 . . ."—Holotypus, US! isotypus, NY!
Sena spuria tetraphylla, siliqua lata compressa Sloane, Voy. Jam. 2: 49, t. 180, fig. 6, 7. 1725.
Cassia viminea sensu Bentham, 1871, p.p., quoad pl. jamaic; Fawcett & Rendle, 1920, p. 103;
Adams, 1972, p. 324.