192 ON SOUTH-AMERICAN APOCYNACEA, 
was followed by other botanists, who continued to heap up in this genus a great number 
of plants bearing little relation to the true type, thus creating great confusion up to the 
present time. 
The order Apocynee was not proposed until 1789, and then vaguely, as Jussieu in- 
cluded in it all the Asclepiadee, Loganiacee, and other groups of plants. It was not 
till 1811 that the celebrated Rob. Brown remedied this confusion by separating and 
defining the Apocynee and the Asclepiadee as distinct families, in the former of which 
the genus Echites is enumerated in terms differing little from those of Jacquin. The 
genus, still ill-defined, continued to increase in the number of species, when, in 1844, 
Prof. De Candolle enumerated 177 species, a number soon after considerably increased 
by Müller, all proposed without any relation to the structural peculiarities of the original 
type. 
In this memoir I have endeavoured to separate the legitimate species, amounting to 
about 40, from the mass of above 200 of those recorded by authors. "The plants of true 
Echites may be distinguished not only by the floral characters, but by having several 
pointed glands, arranged transversely across the nodes in the usual place of stipules, and 
in having similar glands at the base of the midrib of the leaves at their junction with 
the petioles. The following is an amended diagnosis of the genus. 
Ecurres, P. Browne, Jam. p. 18; Jacq. Amer. p. 29; Linn. Sp. Pl. (1764) in parte; R. Brown, Mem. 
Wern. Soc. i. p. 396. Sepala 5, parva, acuta, intus singulatim squama profunde plurilacinulata 
munita; corolla tubularis ; tubus longiusculus, imo breviter et anguste cylindricus, supra latior, sub- 
quinquangularis, hine szpe spiraliter tortus, fauce subconstrictus ; segmenta 5, truncatim dolabri- 
formia, oblonga vel tubo breviora, dextrorsum convoluta. Stamina ad constrictionem tubi inserta ; 
filamenta tenuia, subbrevia; anthere rigide lineares, acuminate, imo in furcas 2 breves acutas 
fisse. Discus e lobis 5 obtuse linearibus, carnosulus; ovaria 2 illum subequantia; stylus tenuis ; 
clavuncula incrassata, oblonga ; stigmata 2, parva, terminalia. Folliculi 2, aut erecti vel horizon- 
taliter divaricati, anguste teretes, sutura ventrali dehiscentes. Semina plurima, lineari-oblonga, com- 
pressa, rugulosa, funiculo brevissimo raphe continuo suspensa, coma sericeo-pilosa paullo longiore 
coronata. 
Frutices scandentes Americe intertropice ; ramuli ad nodos glandulis acutis plurimis prediti; folia 
opposita, petiolata, ovata aut oblonga, ad costam petiolum versus glandulis carnosulis munita; inflore- 
scentia azillaris, sepe bifida; flores plurimi, pulchri, pedicellati, umbellatim aut congestim aggregati ; 
pedicelli brevissime bracteolati. 
l. Ecurres ovata (scandens foliis ovatis), P. Browne, Hist. Jam. p. 182: Apocynum folio rotundo, 
Sloane, Jam. 1207, tab. 131. fig. 2, Cat. Jam. p. 89: Apocynum scandens, Catesb. Carol. i. p. 58, 
tab. 58. In Antillis: v. s. in herb. Mus. Brit. Jamaica (Shakespear, Houston). 
The original type of the genus, which is fully described by Dr. Browne, and well 
figured by Sloane and Catesby. It grows on the dry (not moist) parts of the savannas 
of Jamaica; its scandent flexuose branches have axils 1} in. apart; leaves ovate, 
rounded at the base, subaeute at the apex, rigidly membranaceous, dark green above, 
paler and opake beneath, with about 11 pam of subdivergent, parallel, prominent nerves 
arcuately conjoined, 2-25 in. long, 11-21 in. broad, on channelled petioles 3-6 lines long; 
raceme lateral, short, on a Mirad sae 4-6 lines long, bearing 2-5 aggregated 
e e E mn, mmm A 
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