and almost hyaline. Stamens 3; filaments distinct; anthers 1-celled. Female flowers: Perianth as in the males. Staminodia 3, sometimes with abortive anthers. Ovary 3-angled, 3-celled; styles 3. free or connate at the base; ovules 1 in each cell. Capsule triquetrous, dehiscing at the angles.
A small genus of 15 species, all confined to Australia except the following one.
1. L. Traversii, F. Muell. Fragm. viii. 79.—Rhizome stout, creeping, clothed with pale-chestnut scales; roots long, stringy. Stems stout, terete, polished, simple below, fastigiately branched above, 2–5 ft. high. Sheaths distant, closely appressed, acuminate, ¾–1 in. long. Inflorescence a rather narrow closely branched red-brown terminal panicle 2–5 in. long; branches erect, unequal; bracts under the branches rigid, lanceolate, acuminate. Flowers sessile or shortly pedicelled within lanceolate glumes rather longer than the perianth; 2 scarious bracteoles at the base of each flower. Perianth-segments in both sexes red-brown, lanceolate, acute; male flowers with a small rudimentary ovary, females with 3 slender staminodia. Anthers linear-oblong, minutely apiculate. Ripe fruit 1-celled, 1-seeded, obliquely ovoid, triquetrous with the angles thickened, tipped with the remains of the style, at length dehiscent along the angles.—Calorophus sp., Hook. f. Fl. Nov. Zel. i. 267. Sporadanthus Traversii, F. Muell. in Trans. N.Z. Inst. vii. (1875) 389; Kirk, ibid. x. App. 41.
North Island: Auckland—Swamps between Hamilton and Ohaupo, Middle Waikato district, T.F.C. Chatham Islands: Abundant in peaty swamps, Dieffenbach, H. H. Travers! Cockayne!
A very curious species. It differs from Lepyrodia in the 1-celled and 1-seeded fruit, and was consequently erected into a separate genus (Sporadanthus) by F. Mueller. In its other characters and in habit, however, it is altogether a Lepyrodia, and it appears best to consider it a species of that genus with the ovary 1-celled by abortion. I have not seen female flowers except old ones persistent with the fruit, and cannot say whether the ovary is 3-celled at an early stage, as seems probable.
2. LEPTOCARPUS, R. Br.
Stems simple or branched, terete, erect from a stout creeping scaly rhizome. Leaves reduced to persistent sheathing scales. Flowers diœcious, the spikelets with imbricate glumes with or without bracteoles, the male and female inflorescences alike or dissimilar, sometimes both sexes have the spikelets arranged in panicles, sometimes the male spikelets are pedicelled and paniculate, and the females sessile and fascicled or spicate. Male flowers: Perianth-segments 6. Stamens 3; filaments filiform; anthers 1-celled. Female flowers: Perianth as in the males. Staminodia 3 or none. Ovary 1-celled, triquetrous; styles 3, filiform; ovule solitary, pendulous. Fruit narrow-ovoid, triquetrous, indehiscent or splitting down the angles.
