140 Mr. J. Miers on the Styracese, 



by thick osseous deposits, I am unable to explain. I can only 

 vouch for the truth of the facts as they are here recorded*. 



In regard to the affinities of the ^tyracetje, I have, in a pre- 

 ceding page, stated my conviction, following the mode of infer- 

 ence adopted by Jussieu, that, from the structure of its ovary, it 

 should hold a position near the Olacacecdy Uumiriacemy and Me- 

 liacece f. Later botanists have lost sight of the true affinities of 

 this order, from having been led away by its supposed connexion 

 with the SymplocacecEy — a misconception which I have endea- 

 voured to rectify. It has from this cause been placed near 

 Ehenacea, on account of the partial agglutination of its petals 

 and stamens into a tube ; but this character ought never to have 

 been thus considered as one of such primary importance, because 

 that union is never perfect ; for in ^tyracecB, even more than in 

 Si/mplocacecBy those parts may always be separated readily and 

 without laceration. Prof. A. DeCandoUe (Prodr. viii. 245), 

 though he admits in some degree its relationship towards 

 MeliacecB and HumiriacecEy yet considers such an affinity to be 

 distant, on account of its ovary being sometimes inferior, also 

 because of the want of a nectary, the different mode of inser- 

 tion of the corolla, and a dissimilarity in the manner of junc- 

 tion of its monadelphous stamens. But I have shown that 

 in the true Styracem (excluding the Symplocacece) the ovary 

 is always wholly superior, or partially superior in those excep- 

 tional cases where, by a peculiar mode of growth, it becomes 

 subsequently inferior : this partial immersion of the base of the 

 ovary at an early stage, in Halesia, is probably owing to the 

 existence of a disk (the rudiment of a nectary, as in Humiriacece, 

 or analogous to the disk in Olacacece), which is here adnate both 

 to it and to the tube of the calyx. In Olacace<2 we find in some 

 cases a growth very analogous to that of Halesia, — in Strombosia 

 for instance, where the calyx, in like manner, is small and infe- 

 rior, the ovary being surmounted and surrounded by a thick 

 fleshy five-lobed disk which rises from the torus ; by the downward 

 growth of the ovary, in a manner similar to that described in 



* A very analogous circumstance is recorded by Mr. R. Brown in the 

 case of Persoonia (Linn. Trans, x. 35), where the ovarium is unilocular 

 and contains two ovules ; after fecundation, a cellular substance is inter- 

 posed between them, and this gradually indurating, acquires in the ripe 

 fruit the same consistence as the putamen itself, from whose substance it 

 cannot be distinguished ; and thus a cell, originally unilocular, becomes 

 bilocular. The same occurs in Tribulus, where each cell of the ovary 

 becomes thus divided into four osseous superposed cellules ; and a similar 

 growth takes place in Bontia. 



t See also my remarks on the affinity of Styraceos with Olacacece, Ann. 

 Nat. Hist. 2 ser. viii. 163; Contrib. to Botany, i. 23. 



