A. RADCLIFFE-SMITH

A monoecious annual or sometimes perennial decumbent or erect, usually glabrous, sometimes puberulous or hispid herb up to 30 cm, sometimes taller, with angular branches. Cataphylls borne 1-2 mm clear of their stipules on the intermediate shoots, triangular-lanceolate, c. 1 mm long, acute, subentire. Foliage leaves: petioles 0.5 mm long; leaf-blades oblong, oblong-oblanceolate or linear-oblong, 5-16 x 2-9 mm, usually rounded at apex and base, ± entire but often with minute tooth-like hairs around the margin, membranous, lateral nerves c. 6 pairs, distinct, glaucous beneath, folding upwards when touched. Stipules of the cataphylls lanceolate, 2 mm long, acuminate, auriculate-sagittate; those of the leaves triangular-lanceolate, 0.5-1 mm long, unequal, not auriculate, stramineous. Proximal nodes ♀, distal ♂. Male flowers: pedicels articulate above the middle; sepals 6, obovate, 0.5 mm long, obtuse, glabrous, pale yellow; disc-glands 6, rounded, papillose; stamens 3, filaments united into a short column, anthers sessile but not fused together, erect, vertically dehiscent. Female flowers: pedicels very short and thick or flowers ± sessile; sepals 6, oblong-lanceolate, 1 mm long, obtuse or subacute, subglabrous, yellowish with a reddish-olive midrib; disc flat, irregularly 9-lobed; ovary subglobose, 1 mm diam, verruculose; styles 3, very short, closely oppressed to the top of the ovary, bifid, the segments recurved. Fruit somewhat depressed-subglobose,. shallowly hexalobate, 2.5 mm diam., sparingly beset with short transverse rows of flattened triangular tubercles, olivaceous, stramineous or reddish. Seeds 1.3 x l x 1 mm, transversely ridged, with c. 15 ridges on the back and fewer on the sides, yellowish-brown.

Fl. & Fr. Per.: August-October.

Syntypes: Sri Lanka, Herb. Hermann, Vols. II, f. 7, III, f. 55, IV, f. 41 (BM).

Distribution: Pantropical (Hooker, l.c., Airy Shaw, 1972); Tropical Asia, introduced elsewhere (Webster, 1957). By river-banks, in forests, 2000'/610m. -3000'1914 m.