344) - Mr. J. Miers on the Canellacese. 



Adrien de Jussieu (1830), in his monograph of the Meliacea, 

 offered valid reasons* for its exclusion from that family, as well 

 as from the Guttiferce, without assigning, however, any positive 

 locality for this genus. 



Prof, von Martins (1829), in his 'Gen. et Spec' iii. 163, de- 

 scribed at some length and figured a new genus, Platonia, 

 founded on another Brazilian tree having much the habit of the 

 Guttiferce. This genus he proposed to associate with Canella in 

 a new family, the Canellacece, which he placed next to GuttifercEf 

 which view was adopted by Endlicher in his ' Genera Plantarum,' 

 who then added to it his new genus Cinnamodendron, 



Prof. Lindley (1836), in his 'Introduction to Botany' (p. 76), 

 followed the example of Endlicher in adopting the Canellacece^ 

 and in placing it next to Guttiferce-, but subsequently (in 1846) 

 he changed his views, removing the former family as a sub- 

 order of the Pittosporacecsf, and considering the Canellacece as 

 intermediate between it and Olacacece. 



Richard J suggested its affinity with the Ternstroemiacece. 



Choisy (1850), in his last review of the Clusiacece^, has some- 

 what modified his former view by adopting the suggestion of 

 Richard, and in placing this small group as a suborder of the 

 Ternstrcemiacece, an affinity that can be justified only as regards 

 Platonia, which genus, though of proximate relationship, cannot 

 be referred to that family II . 



In the midst of such conflicting authorities, it appeared to me 

 desirable to search for more certain grounds on which to base 

 the true affinities of this small group : it is now some time since, 

 with this view, I investigated carefully the structure both of the 

 flower and seed ; and this examination led me to place it in a 

 position very diff'erent from any yet assigned to it, for it appears 

 to me that the Canellacece must range close to Drimys and its 

 congeners, as I shall proceed to show. 



The details of the structure of Canella, as originally given by 

 Swartz^, are tolerably correct: the flower has three persistent^ 

 imbricated sepals ; five deciduous fleshy petals imbricated in aesti- 

 vation ; its stamens are united into a fleshy, monadelphous tube 



* Mem. Mus. xix. 185. f Veg. Kingd. 442. 



X Flore de Cuba, p. 245. § Mem. Soc. Phys. Geneve, xii. 381. 



II This genus I consider to belong to the M.oronobeacea, a group I pro- 

 pose to separate from the Clusiacece, and which will comprise Moronobea, 

 Chrysopia, Platonia, and two new genera, — Perissus (the type of which is 

 P. lucidus, from Rio Negro, Spruce, 2159), and Catalissa (founded upon 

 C.Blanchetiana, from Bahia, Blanchet, 1671). In a memoir yet unpub- 

 lished, I have described all the above genera and their species, giving at 

 the same time the characters and affinities of the Order, which I consider 

 to be intermediate with the Ternstrcemiacece and Hypericacece. 



f Linn. Trims, i. p. 99. tab. 8. 



