Plate 195.
Reading edition
ATHRIXIA ELATA. Basutoland, Cape Province, Natal, O.F.S., Transvaal. Compositae. Tribe Inuloideae. Athrixia, Ker.; Benth. et Hook. f. Gen. Plant, vol. ii. p. 328.
Athrixia elata, Sond. in Linn. vol. xxiii. p. 67; Fl. Cap. vol. iii. p. 292.
The plant figured on the accompanying Plate is a much-branched shrub almost 1 m. high, and may be found in flower on the hills surrounding Pretoria during the month of August. It grows in masses in certain localities and flowers very profusely; if brought under cultivation it could no doubt be much improved so as to make it a desirable garden plant.
Athrixia elata is found on the Drakensberg in Natal, in Basutoland, the eastern Free State and on the spurs of the Drakensberg in the northern Transvaal, but extends westwards in the Transvaal as far as Rustenburg. The travellers Burke and Zeyher collected specimens almost 100 years ago on the Magaliesberg, and Cooper also came across the plant in his journey through Basutoland in 1861.
We are indebted to Mr. C. A. Smith, B.Sc., for the specimens from which our Plate was prepared.
Description:—A much-branched shrub. Leaves alternate, sessile, 0·5 to 2·5 cm. long, linear, acute, pungent, with revolute margins, glabrous above, woolly beneath. Heads subsessile, solitary, terminal, 2·5 to 3 cm. in diameter (including the rays). Involucral-bracts in many rows, unequal; the outer gradually shorter, recurved, aristate, 3 to 4 mm. long, 1 mm. broad, narrowly ovate with the apices edged with brown to black, woolly; inner 5 to 6 mm. long, 1 mm. broad, linear-oblong; innermost 7 to 8·5 mm. long, 0·5 to 1 mm. broad, narrow-linear to oblong-elliptic, with membranous margins. Receptacle flat, nude, honeycombed with the margins of the cells evident. Ray-florets female; tube 4 to 5 mm. long, cylindric, widening above, glabrous; lamina oblong-elliptic. Ovary terete, pilose; style cylindric, glabrous, deeply 2-cleft. Disc-florets hermaphrodite, fertile. Corolla 6 mm. long, tubular, cylindric below, then articulated and the uppermost one-third slightly wider, glabrous. Anthers tailed at the base, with an ovate obtuse apical appendage. Ovary pilose; style cylindric, glabrous, deeply 2-cleft; branches 1 mm. long, linear, truncate, penicillate. Pappus-bristles equalling the corolla-tube, rigid, persistent, subplumose in the uppermost one-third, alternating with minute serrulate scales. (National Herb., Pretoria, 2942.)
Plate 195.—Fig. 1, diagrammatic longitudinal section of head; Fig. 2, ray-floret; Fig. 3, disc-floret; Fig. 4, involucral-bract; Fig. 5, pappus enlarged; Fig. 6, pappus-bristle; Fig. 7, fimbriated pappus-scale.
F.P.S.A., 1925.
