This plant, therefore, agrees in several respects with [page 343]
Drosophyllum, but differs in the following points. I could detect no
sessile glands; nor would these have been of any use, as the upper
surface of the leaves is thickly clothed with pointed, unicellular
hairs directed upwards. The pedicels of the tentacles do not include
spiral vessels; nor are there any spiral cells within the glands. The
leaves often arise in tufts and are pinnatifid, the divisions
projecting at right angles to the main linear blade. These lateral
divisions are often very short and bear only a single terminal
tentacle, with one or two short ones on the sides. No distinct line of
demarcation can be drawn between the pedicels of the long terminal
tentacles and the much attenuated summits of the leaves. We may,
indeed, arbitrarily fix on the point to which the spiral vessels
proceeding from the blade extend; but there is no other distinction.
It was evident from the many particles of dirt sticking to the glands
that they secrete much viscid matter. A large number of insects of many
kinds also adhered to the leaves. I could nowhere discover any signs of
the tentacles having been inflected over the captured insects; and this
probably would have been seen even in the dried specimens, had they
possessed the power of movement. Hence, in this negative character,
Roridula resembles its northern representative, Drosophyllum.
BYBLIS.
Byblis gigantea (Western Australia). A dried specimen, about 18 inches
in height, with a strong stem, was sent me from Kew. The leaves are
some inches in length, linear, slightly flattened, with a small
projecting rib on the lower surface. They are covered on all sides by
glands of two kinds [page 344] sessile ones arranged in rows, and
others supported on moderately long pedicels. Towards the narrow
summits of the leaves the pedicels are longer than elsewhere, and here
equal the diameter of the leaf. The glands are purplish, much
flattened, and formed of a single layer of radiating cells, which in
the larger glands are from forty to fifty in number. The pedicels
consist of single elongated cells, with colourless, extremely delicate
walls, marked with the finest intersecting spiral lines. Whether these
lines are the result of contraction from the drying of the walls, I do
not know, but the whole pedicel was often spirally rolled up. These
295