Page:Manual of the New Zealand Flora.djvu/630

590 acuminate, narrowed to a rounded or subcordate base, membranous, glabrous or strigose on the midrib beneath, margins serrulate; stipules long, closely sheathing, ciliate and pilose with long erect hairs. Spikes terminal, very slender, simple or sparingly branched, 1–2 in. long; bracts narrow-turbinate, truncate, margins ciliate. Flowers 2–3 to each bract, small, reddish, $1⁄12$ in. long. Perianth-segments oblong, obtuse, glabrous and eglaudular. Stamens 5 or 6. Style-branches 2, rarely 3. Nut plano-convex with obtuse margins, rarely trigonous, smooth and shining.—P. minus var. decipiens, ''Hook. f. Handb. N.Z. Fl.'' 235. P. prostratum, ''A. Rich. Fl. Nov. Zel. 177 (not of B. Br.); A. Cunn. Precur. n. 358; Raoul, Choix, 42; Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel.'' i. 209.

Perennial or annual herbs, very rarely shrubby. Leaves all radical or radical and cauline, often cordate or hastate at the base, entire or toothed or almost pinnatifid. Flowers hermaphrodite or less commonly unisexual, small, green, in axillary clusters or whorls, often forming simple or panicled racemes. Perianth-segments 6, the 3 inner enlarging and closing over the fruit, margins entire or toothed, midrib often tubercled. Stamens 6. Ovary 3-gonous; styles short, filiform; stigmas fimbriate. Nut 3-gonous, included in the enlarged inner perianth-segments, angles acute. Embryo lateral.

1. R. flexuosus, ''Sol. ex Forst. Prodr.'' n. 515.—A glabrous perennial herb with a diffusely branched stem 6–18 in. high; branches slender, grooved, flexuous, divaricate. Leaves chiefly