Clethra occidentalis (L.) Kuntze

Clethra jamaicensis Britton, sp. nov
Twigs, petioles, and inflorescence brown-tomentose or villous. Leaves elliptic, thin in texture, acute or short-acuminate, sharply serrate above the middle, 10-18 cm. long, 8 cm. wide or less, dark-green and glabrous or nearly so above, villous on the veins and light-green beneath, the villous petioles 1-1.7 cm. long; racemes about 6, slender, 23 cm. long or less; pedicels 3-7 mm. long; bracts subulate, as long as the pedicels or shorter; calyx tomentulose, 4-4.5 cm. long, its segments ovate; petals obovate, about as long as the calyx; style shorter than the petals; ovary villous.
Type collected in woods near Port Antonio, Jamaica, July 7, 1897, A. Fredholm 3135 (herb. N. Y. Bot. Card.).

Clethra occidentalis (L.) Steud. (Norn. Bot. Phan. 207, as
synonym. 1821.)
Tinus occidentalis L. Syst. Nat. ed. 10. 1010. 1759. Tinus Volkameria Crantz, Inst. 2: 376. 1766. Cletkra trifolia Sw. Prodr. 74. 1788. Clethra tinifolia Sw. Fl. Ind. Occ. 845. 1800.
A tree up to 18 m. high, or sometimes a shrub; the rather slender twigs brown-tomentose. Leaves oblong or elliptic to oblongobovate, subcoriaceous, entire or sparingly low-denticulate, 2 dm. long or less, 3-9 cm. wide, glabrous, or nearly so, and dark-green above, densely whitetomentulose or gray-tomentulose, and brown-tomentulose on the veins, beneath, the tomentose petioles 6-20 mm. long; racemes several, 6-18 cm. long, tomentose; pedicels 2.5-6 mm. long; calyx 3-4 :inm. long, tomentulose, its segments ovate or oblong-ovate, obtuse or obtusish; bracts linear, about as long as the pedicels or shorter; petals obovate, entire or nearly so, equaling or a little longer than the calyx; style about 2.5 mm. long; capsule depressed-globose, bltmtly 3-lobed, densely pubescent, about 3.5 mm. in diameter.
Type locality: Jamaica [Sixteen -mile Walk].
Distribution: Jamaica; recorded from Mexico, probably erroneously.