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

1982] CASSIINAE—SENNA 171
coriaceous free wings ±2 mm wide from the length of both sutures, the epidermis
of valves brown, densely coarsely papillate; seeds (not seen fuUy ripe) biseriate,
turned broadside to the septa, clothed in thin black pulp, ±5 mm long, angulately
eUipsoid-semiobovoid, the testa brown, duUish.—Collections: 22.—Fig. 17.
Montane and lowland, virgin and secondary forest, sometimes on laterite,
10-700 m, known only from French Guiana, especially from the hiU country
drained by the sources of the Oyapock, Approuague and western affluents of the
Maroni river, but occasional also on or near the outer margin of the coastal plain
between Kourou and Kaw, to be expected on the Brazilian slope of Sa. Tumu­
cumaque in adjoining Amapa.—Fl. I-IV.
The very distinct S. lourteigiana was among the first species of ser. Bacillares
to be discovered (cf. specimens in the CandoUe and Willdenow herbaria at B, G),
and has gone undescribed untU now only because mistaken either for Chamaecrista
apoucouita (which has, of course, cupshaped, not claviform petiolar glands)
or for 5. georgica, rather simUar in fohage but entirely different in flower and
pod. The individual flower of S. lourteigiana outwardly resembles that of S.
georgica in the ample sepals, but has three adaxial stamens notably shorter, not
much longer, than the four median ones; and its pod is relatively short and quadrangular,
not compressed and narrowly ribbonhke, accommodating the seeds in
two rows, not in one. Our diagnosis somewhat arbitrarily compares S. lourtei­
giana with S. undulata, not unlike it in general aspect of the foliage and in the
presence of a gland between each pair of leaflets. However the enlarged petaloid
bracts, smaller flowers, and coarsely venulose cyUndric pod of S. undulata are
markedly different.
We take special pleasure in dedicating to Dr. Alicia Lourteig this handsome
senna, which is endemic, so far as known, to French territory. Dr. Lourteig's
knowledge of the history and botanical resources of the Museum d'Histoire Na­
turelle in Paris is unrivalled, and her generosity in sharing her knowledge with
visitors from America is proverbial.
36. Senna chrysocarpa (Desvaux) Irwin & Barneby, comb. nov. Cassia chrysocarpa
Desvaux, J. Bot. 3(2): 72. 1814.—"Habitat in Gujana."—Holotypus,
P (hb. Desvaux.)! isotypus (fragm), F!—C. chrysotricha Col­
ladon, Hist. Casses 99, nom. illegit., t. 13. 1816.—"Hab. in Guiana.
Patris (v.s. sp. in h. DC.)."—Sp. authent.: "Cayenne," G-DC!
Cassia virgata L. C. Richard, Actes Soc. Hist. Nat. Paris 1: 108. 1792.—". . . e Cayenna .
missarum a domino LeBlond."—Holotypus, LeBlond s.n., P (hb. Richard.)!—Non C. virgata
Swartz, 1788.
Cassia chrysogyne Miquel, Linnaea 18: 581. 1844.—^'Crescit prope Paramaribo in sylva juxta
viam ad Kwatta, ad Wanicka, m. Sept. [H. G. Focke].''—Holotypus, U, not seen; isotypus,
labelled 'Surinam. Focke [misit] Miquel,' K (hb. Benth.)! = NY Neg. 74^3.—Equated with
C. chrysocarpa by Bentham, 1871, p. 523.
Weakly woody shrubs and bush-ropes, in open places or on newly cleared land
diffusely ascending, becoming sarmentose in older capoeira and at forest margins,
the terminal flowering branchlets then often semi-pendulous from the canopy, at
anthesis 2-10 m, the stems prominently angulate, variably pUosulous or strigulose
almost throughout with appressed, antrorsely or retrorsely incurved, sometimes
suberect hairs up to 0. l-0.3(-0.4) mm, the fohage strongly bicolored, the Ift-
blades sublustrously dark- or brownish-ohvaceous above, paler duU beneath,
usuaUy pubescent on both faces but sometimes glabrous except along major veins,
the gray- or yellow-pubescent inflorescence often elongately narrow-thyrsiform-