Piper.] CXXIV. PIPERACEE. (J. D. Hooker.) 79 
or connate in a semilunar form, Perianth 0. Stamens 1-4, rarely more, 
filaments short; anthers 2-celled, cells often confluent by dehiscence. 
Ovary l-celled ; style conic beaked or 0, stigmas 2-5; ovule solitary, erect. 
Berry ovoid or globose. Seed usually globose, testa thin, albumen hard.— 
Species described about 500 (probably greatly exaggerated), all tropical or 
subtropical. 
A most difficult genus, Herbarium materials for the analysis of. which have never 
been intelligently collected, whilst the descriptions of the published species are quite 
Inadequate for their accurate determination. Wallich’s Herbarium, and the diag- 
hoses in Vahl's * Enumeratio " and in Roxburgh’s “ Flora Indica” form the basis of 
the works of the only two authors who have attempted the revision of the Indian species, 
namely Miquel and Casimir De Candolle. Of these Wallich’s specimens are so mixed 
that in some cases three or four species are included under one name and number, 
and even on one sheet; whilst of Vahl’s diagnoses not one is sufficient to identify the 
plant he means, and of Roxburgh’s only one or two species are recognizable. Wal- 
lich, it is true, often attaches to his specimens names given by Roxburgh, but these 
are rarely the names that are taken up in the “Flora Indica ;” or if they are, they 
do not apply to the plants described in that work. The only considerable collections 
of Indian Piperacee made since Wallich’s were distributed, are Wight's Peninsular, 
Griffith's Transgangetic Indian, and Thomson's and my own from Sikkim, Bengal, the 
‘Khasia Mts., &c. Wight- published good figures of several, but confined himself to 
such -as were named by Miquel and to the reproduction of a few of Roxburgh’s un- 
Published Icones, procured from the Calcutta Botanic Gardens, Griffith’s specimens 
were hurriedly collected, with no attempt to match the sexes, or the flowering with 
the fruiting specimens, for doing which his rapid journeys precluded the possibility. . 
Unfortunately the Ceylon peppers were not thoroughly studied by either Gardner or 
Thwaites, the only two botanists who had opportunities for so doing previous*o Dr. 
Trimen’s incumbency of the Botanical Gardens, -and who will doubtless elucidate 
them. In the process of attempting (with little success, I fear) to discriminate the 
ndian species for this work, and to unravel their intricate synonymy, I have been 
much impressed by the correctness of Miquel’s views as to the ordination ‘of the 
Species, and the skill with which he has grouped them. When he undertook to 
Monograph the Order, the materials were very bad, were in a chaotic state of con- 
fusion, and were so scattered in the British and Continental herbaria, that he could 
Ug no two large collections under his eye at one time. Yet he traced the out- 
lines of a good system, gave characters to a large proportion of well-defined species, 
and founded genera, which though now reduced to sections of one genus are for the 
Most part natural groups. In the discrimination and elucidation of species he was 
hasty by far. For the rest I must leave the further study of the Order to 
local botanists in the -four great centres of its Indian distribution, namely its trans- 
gangetic provinces, the South Deccan, the Malayan Peninsuld, and Ceylon; in 
each of which the species should be examined on the spot, with a view to matching 
9 sexes, and flowering with fruiting specimens, and to observing the transition 
rom young to old foliage, and the effects of locality and climate on the characters 
of each species, s 
Sect. I. Muldera. Spikes solitary. Flowers dicecious, the males 
Sunk in a fleshy stipitate or sessile receptacle formed of the greatly enlarged 
ract (and bracteoles?). Berries sessile; stigmas sessile——The female 
Plants of this section are imperfectly known, and may possibly be confounded 
with others, l 
* Receptacle of male fl. stipitate. 
l.P. Schizonephros, Cas. DC. in Prodr. xvi. 241 ; quite glabrous, 
leaves coriaceous elliptic-lanceolate acuminate 3-nerved at the very base, 
male Spikes hoary, receptacles distant stipitate not recurved about 8- 
androus, Schizonephros glaucescens, Griff. Notul. iv. 383. 
