Mr. J. Miers on the Calyceracese. 279 



XXXVIIL— On the CalyceraceaB. 

 By John Miers, F.R.S., F.L.S. &c. 



[Continued from p. 190.] 



2. Gamocarpha. 



The typical species was collected in Chile by Poppig, who de- 

 scribed and figured it under the name of Boopis alpina. DeCan- 

 dolle afterwards founded upon it his genus Gamocarpha, its 

 name expressing the fact of the accretion of its palese, first indi- 

 cated by Lessing, from whose imperfect account DeCandolle 

 established his brief and defective generic character. Lessing's 

 obscure description is as follows : " Bracteolse (palese) 1-nervise, 

 acuta?, apice foliacese connatse in alveolas profundas ovaria tota 

 laciniis 5 ellipticis, acutis, ipsis brevioribus coronata includentes." 

 (Linn. vi. 259.) Poppig states that the inner whorls of involu- 

 cral leaflets are sometimes small or rudimentary, " nonnunquam 

 minima? vel rudimentarise, sensim in bracteolas (paleas) per re- 

 ceptaculum planiusculum sparsas transeuntes." (Nov. Gen. i. 21.) 

 DeCandolle makes no mention of the existence of any palese, 

 nor of the fact of their accretion which gave rise to his name of 

 Gamocarpha, while the presence of palese is distinctly specified 

 in all the other genera of the family ; in their place, however, 

 he states the existence of a fringed sheath round the base of 

 each ovary, which I have not been able to discover : he says, 

 " fimbrillse recept. acutse in alveolas concretse." From this it is 

 manifest that he never examined the plant, that he did not un- 

 derstand Lessing's meaning (rendered still more obscure by 

 Poppig's description), and that he consequently omitted all 

 details of this unusual structure. 



I have had an opportunity of examining a plant in the Herba- 

 rium of the Paris Museum, collected by Gay in the same neigh- 

 bourhood as that where Poppig found his specimens ; and this, 

 compared with the drawing and description of the latter botanist, 

 shows beyond any doubt that it is identical with the typical 

 species which Lessing and Poppig have severally described. 

 The involucre is here composed of six external folioles, which are 

 very thick and fleshy, and united at their base into a short tube, 

 upon the margin of the fleshy receptacle ; within this are four 

 concentric series of palese, which are nearly of the length and 

 size of the folioles, and are equally fleshy and green at their 

 summits, though more membranaceous below : they are confluent 

 by their margins for half their length, and the intervals between 

 them are again divided by a number of membranaceous septa ema- 

 nating from the fleshy midribs of some of the palese, and united 

 to the margins of others in the adjoining series, forming in this 



