A TEIBE OP EHIZOPHOEAOE^ . 71 



has since, however, at the suggestion of E. Brown (in the Ap- 

 pendix to Tuckey's * Congo '), been reduced by DeCandolle in his 

 * Prodromus' to Cassipourea ; and I described as such, in the ' iN^iger 

 Flora,' a West African species, which, as I there mentioned, may 

 not improbably be the Congo Cassipourea referred to by B. Brown. 

 In the mean time Gardner met with a plant in Ceylon, which he 

 did not immediately recognize as belonging to this group, but 

 conceived to be allied in its fimbriate petals to Elceocarpece. He 

 accordingly described and figured it in the ' Calcutta Journal ' as 

 a new genus of that order, under the name of Anstrutheria. Sub- 

 sequently Major Champion, in a note addressed to Dr. G-ardner 

 in 1849, pointed out its relation to Cassipourea, and in the Hook- 

 erian herbarium it is identified generically with Bichceia both by 

 Sir "W. Hooker and by Planchon. Under these circumstances, the 

 genus, if maintained as distinct from Cassipourea, should have re- 

 tained Dupetit Thenars' name of Hichceia, were it not that it may 

 be considered as too close, both in sound and derivation, to the 

 previously published Michea in Mpacridece. Its union with Cassi- 

 pourea can only be effected with propriety, in the present state of 

 our acquaintance with these plants, by uniting into one genus all 

 the LegnotidecB with a free or superior ovarium, from Gynotroclies 

 to Cassipou/rea. If that view be adopted, the six genera here 

 characterized may be considered as so many sections, and Anstru- 

 theria will still be the name to be preferred, whether for a section 

 or a genus. The three species it comprises are evidently closely 

 allied to each other. I have seen abundance of good specimens 

 of the Ceylonese one, which varies with broadly ovate, almost 

 membranous leaves, or much narrower and more coriaceous ones. 

 Prom the latter form, the West African specimens, which I have in 

 fruit only, and in very young bud, appear scarcely to differ, except 

 in the size of the flowers, which appear to have been considerably 

 smaller ; and I have seen no specimen of the Madagascar one. I 

 am therefore quite unable to give at present any distinctive dia- 

 gnosis of the three species, if such they be. 



Blephaeistemma. 



The history of the name and original specimen of the only 

 species constituting this genus has been already given. It was 

 also collected in the Indian Peninsula by Hochstetter, and has 

 been distributed with his Canara plants under the name of Dryp- 

 topetalum memhranaceum, Miq. It is, however, much nearer re- 

 lated to Cassipourea than to Gynotroclies ; it scarcely differs indeed 



