MK. G. BEXTHA:M on 3irETACE.E. 141 



but the stamens not perceptibly clustered ; and in the remaining 

 species which on general grounds would belong to the same sec- 

 tion, neither character is clearly appreciable, AYe have thought 

 ourselves, therefore, compelled to follow F. Mueller in reducing 

 Etidesmia to a section of Eucalyptus. Sj/mpJiyomyrtus^ Schau., 

 has still weaker claims to maintenance. It was founded on Eu- 

 calyptus LeJimanni, Preiss, a species so closely allied to E. cornuta, 

 LabilL, that I\ Mueller thinks it a variety only, but in which the 

 calyces, instead of being closely sessile only, are more or less im- 

 mersed in the enlarged and thickened receptacles — a character to 

 wliich we can by no means give any more than a specific value. 



Since the above notes were penned, I have received from Afr. 

 Woolls, of Parramatta, iu the ' Sydney Herald ' of the 26th of Aug., 

 1807, a long and interesting article on Eucalyptus^ in which he 

 strongly objects to my arrangement as " placing in the same group 

 species which, in the eyes of the colonists, are always regarded 

 as perfectly distinct from each other, and also of separating, under 

 various sections, trees which, by bark, wood, habit, and general 

 character, ought to stand near each other." These are, it must 

 be admitted, grave objections ; and I should be most ready to adopt 

 any more natural method by which local botanists, liaving the ad- 

 vantage of observing the species in a living state, may arrange 

 the whole genus into groups marked out by tolerably definite cha- 

 racters. Mr. Woolls thinks that Dr. P. Mueller's cortical system 

 is the best that has yet been devised; but as that has not yet been 

 applied to one half of the genus, and, indeed, seems to be scarcely 

 applicable to the low bushy species, and the characters on which it 

 is founded are, in nine cases out of ten, not to be ascertained from 

 museum specimens, or to be derived only from uncertain or con- 

 tradictory collectors' notes, it is at present useless to botanists. 

 We must therefore wait to judge of it till Dr. Mueller has worked 

 it out in his promised monograph. In the meantime it must be 

 admitted that this cortical system is probably excellent for the 

 practical arrangement of the tree Eucalyptuses of limited localities. 

 So also in the south of Europe would be the popular arrangement 

 of Oaks into white Oaks, black Oaks, and cork Oaks (Chenes 

 blancs, Chenes-verts, and Chenes-lieges, as they are there called) ; 

 but botanists would hardly accept of it for the general subdivision 

 of the whole genus Quercus. 



AVith regard to the homology of the operculum oi Eucalyptus^ 

 it is said, in the * Flora Australiensis,' that the single (or, when it is 

 double, the inner) one probably represents the petals, — which is ob- 



