AD FLORAM INDICAM (BALSAMINEZ). 107 
mountains and Ceylon), that practically it is of little aid in 
assisting either the student or the systematist. 
The caulescent group presents a number of inosculating sub- 
divisions, of which we have adopted six, founded primarily on the 
habit and foliation of the species. This has often obliged us to 
separate plants that are very closely related indeed, and even more 
often to refer species of more dubious affinity to one or other 
group in an arbitrary manner. Ав it is, we have chosen what we 
take to be the lesser evil, and only after vainly attempting to 
group the species better by various combinations of the following 
important structural peculiarities :— 
1. The seeds, which are numerous or few, with the testa polished, 
granulate, reticulate, pustulate, or almost villous. These afford 
excellent characters, but often not available in herbarium speci- 
mens; and similar seeds sometimes occur in plants of very different 
habit and floral structure. 
2. The capsules, short, broadly elliptic, acute at both ends; or 
narrow, terete, or club-shaped, also afford excellent characters. 
3. The form of the two combined lateral petals (called by 
Edgeworth and by us ale), which an inspection of the garden 
Balsam, and of the Indian species in a living state, shows to be 
extremely variable. In some these are long and pendulous, in 
others they project horizontally and laterally; the length of the 
posticous lobes of each ala varies extremely, and even in the same 
species (I. Jeptoceras and others), it may itself vary from almost 
undivided to manifestly three-lobed. In J. tingens, Edgw., one lobe 
is developed in sestivation within the spur. 
4. The anticous petal (vexillum, Edgw.) may be erect or pro- 
jecting, flat or arched, entire or bilobed, keeled, cristate, or even 
spurred down the mesial line of the back, the spur sometimes ter- 
minating in a clavate gland (J. racemosa, var. polyceras). Great 
variation of this dorsal appendage in one species is exemplified by 
many. 
5. The posticous or spurred sepal, called by us labellum (by 
Edgeworth galea), undergoes very many modifications in the 
genus, from a broad slightly concave lamina (J. scabrida, tuber- 
culata, &c.) to a funnel-shaped organ with a very long spur (J. 
leptoceras and many others), a cornucopia (T. longicornu), a blunt 
straight sac (I. Walkera, Jerdonie, &c.), or a sac with a longer or 
shorter spur. This sepal is the most deceptive of all as affording 
characters : in J. longicornu it varies from a mere cone to а broad 
deep sac with an abrupt spur; in some of the section Oppositi- 
SS RU 4 ыз. 
