SOUTHERN ASIA AND AFRICA. 589 
made use of as a generic or sectional distinction without separating 
closely allied species, and rendering the place of many others 
doubtful. 
Another character to which Presl assigns great importance, the - 
form of the pod, would appear at first sight to be an excellent 
one, for amongst the several modifications already alluded to, it 
may be difficult to conceive that those of A. macrocarpa, A. pachy- 
loba, A. spinosa, and A. nigra, for instance, could all belong to 
one genus. But, although the fruits of many species are as 
yet unknown, those which have been observed are sufficient to 
show so gradual a transition from one of these extremes to another, 
and so little correspondence in most cases with general habit, 
that we are forced to give up the idea of dividing the genus 
according to this character, although certain forms are generally 
indicative of particular groups, and assist in the arrangement of 
the species. 
The great mass of species are distributed by Presl into two 
genera, Aspalathus and Paraspalathus, distinguished from the 
rest by the absence of those peculiar characters on which the 
Smaller genera are founded, and from each other chiefly by the 
pod which, in Aspalathus, is said to be “ stipitatum cultriforme 
compressum 1-2-3-spermum calyce multoties longius sutura 
dorsali tenui acutaque;" in. Paraspalathus “ calyce brevius aut 
æquilongum sessile ellipticum utrinque acutum compressum mo- 
nospermum." In this division he had in view probably the pod 
of A. spinosa, suffruticosa, &c., in the first instance, and that of 
A. nigra, and others of my Leptantha, in the second, and in each — 
case these respective types run through a considerable number of 
species, but scarcely belong to two-thirds of those to which they 
are attributed, and if the descriptions above quoted be interpreted 
strictly, they would apply to but very few indeed. The “ stylus 
rectus,” also much relied upon in the character of Paraspalathus, 
appears to me to be purely imaginary, as I have seen it invariably 
very much curved in all Aspadathi. I cannot either confirm the 
Supposed distinction in the number of ovules, said to be three in 
Aspalathus, two in Paraspalathus. T find it to be in both cases 
2142? : 
