Stachytarpha
ORD. Verbenaceae. A genus consisting of about forty species of pilose, villous, or glabrous, stove herbs, sub-shrubs, or shrubs, natives of tropical and sub-tropical America, one being also broadly dispersed over tropical Asia and Africa. Flowers white, blue, purple, or scarlet, solitary in the axils of the bracts, sessile or half-immersed in the rachis of the spike; calyx five-toothed; corolla tube straight or incurved, the limb of five broad, spreading, obtuse or retuse lobes, equal or variously unequal; perfect stamens two; bracts sometimes small or narrow, appressed or loose, sometimes ovate or lanceolate, imbricated; spikes terminal. Leaves opposite or alternate, toothed, often wrinkled. All the species thrive in a soil composed of sandy loam and leaf mould. The shrubs may be propagated by cuttings, inserted in sand, under a hand glass, in bottom heat; the perennials may be multiplied by divisions, and the annuals by seeds. The best species, from a garden standpoint, are described below. S. mutabilis is a handsome, perpetual-flowering sub-shrub, the leaves of which have been imported from South America for the purpose of adulterating tea.
S. aristata (awned). fl. rich deep blackish-purple, in a very long, terminal spike, clothed with numerous leafy bracts, tapering suddenly into a long subulation; corolla tube curved. October. l. opposite, ovate or rhomboid-ovate, acute, coarsely serrated, entire at base, tapering towards the base into short footstalks, wrinkled. h. 2ft. South America, 1845. Sub-shrub. (B. M. 4211; F. d. S. 55.) S. bicolor (two-coloured). fl. at first purple, gradually becoming pale greenish-blue, the throat of the long, funnel-shaped corolla remaining white; spike terminal, slender, exceeding the leaves; bracts subulate, erect. June. l. varying from ovate to ovate-lanceolate, acute, serrated from a little above the base. h. 3ft. Brazil, 1865. Shrub. (B. M. 5538.) S. cayennensis (Cayenne). fl. blue, sunk in furrows of the rachis; bracts linear, acuminate, bristly above; spikes slender. May. l. ovate, blunt or bluntish, contracted into the petioles. h. 3ft. Cayenne, 1822. Shrub. S. crassifolia (thick-leaved). fl. azure-blue; bracts hard, ovate; spikes long, slender, terete, straight, glabrous. June. l. 2in. to 3in. long, elliptic or oblong-obovate, entire at base, coarctate, sessile, obtuse, crenate-serrate, the margins revolute, pubescent-tomentose beneath. h. 2ft. Brazil, 1826. Shrub.
S. dichotoma (dichotomously-branched). fl. blue; bracts very narrow; spikes slender, 6in. to 18in. long. June. l. 2in. to 4in. long, ovate or ovate-oblong, coarctate at base, cuneate-decurrent, acute or acuminate, deeply crenate-serrate. Branchlets tetragonal. h. 2ft. South America. A dichotomously-branched sub-shrub. (B. M. 1848, under name of S. urticifolia.) S. jamaicensis (Jamaica). Brazilian Tea-tree. fl. blue, sunk in deep excavations of the thickened rachis; bracts appressed; spikes about as thick as a goose-quill, 6in. to 10in. long. July. l. oval or oblong, coarsely serrated, tapering into the petioles. h. 2ft. West Indies, 1714. Annual, but suffrutescent at base. (B. M. 1860.) S. mutabilis (changeable).* fl. crimson, at length rosy, large, sunk in furrows of the rachis; bracts lanceolate-subulate, spreading above the middle; spikes elongated, erect. All the year. l. ovate, contracted into the petioles, scabrous above, pubescent beneath. h. 3ft. South America, 1801. Sub-shrub. (A. B. R. 435; B. M. 976; R. G. 90.) SYN. Verbena mutabilis. S. urticifolia (Nettle-leaved). A synonym of S. dichotoma.