Academy of Sciences in Pans. 349 



time, and arrived at a similar result. (Vide Report, July lltli, on 

 his Memoir, page 338.) While the memoir of M. dc Jussieu was 

 under the consideration of the reporters, he forwarded to them an- 

 other and more detailed memoir, containing a great variety of inte- 

 resting observations and illustrations of the family Malpighia. The 

 ovuhi of this family are different in their mode of development from 

 all those with which we are acquainted ; they cannot, therefore, be 

 referred to either of the three classes, Orthotropes, Anatropes, and 

 CampulitropeSt as they appear to participate of all these forms. The 

 ovula of the Hippocastanq are entirely anatrope. Two in each 

 ovary, they present the remarkable characteristic, that in developing, 

 one breaks out (se renverse) from top to bottom, and the other from 

 bottom to top. The ovula of the Acerimts are also anatrope, but not 

 so decidedly so as those of the Hippocastana. The Camarea hir- 

 suta, and the Camaria affinis, produce two kinds of flowers, the one 

 conspicuously situated at the upper part of the stem, having four 

 large petals, six well-conditioned stamina, and three fecund pistils ; 

 the other very small, hidden in the angle of the lower leaves, having 

 no corolla, but one indehiscent stamen, no pollen, and two ovaries, 

 generally without style or stigmata, yet producing good seeds like 

 the ovaries of perfect flowers. The father of M. Adrien de Jussieu, 

 in his Genera Plantamm, had divided the family Malpighia into 

 two secondary groups, characterised the one by pulpy, the other 

 by winged fruits ; but M. Adrien de Jussieu remarks, that there 

 are genera with capsular fruits, which belong to neither of these 

 sections, and form a transition from one to the other. M. de 

 Candolle had added a third group, under the name of Malpighia 

 Monostyla; but the supposed single style is, according to M. Adrien 

 de Jussieu, nothing but a bundle composed of several styles fas- 

 tened together, and proceeding from an equal number of united 

 ovaries ; and the genus in question contains species, in some of 

 which the styles are united quite to the summit, while in others, they 

 are separated almost down to the base. The author, therefore, 

 rejects both these divisions, and considering that the genera are only 

 distinguished from each other by small and graduated differences in 

 the degree of abortion, he prefers considering the family as a whole, 

 without establishing any artificial division into tubes or groups. 

 The memoir details the particulars of sixteen known and eight new 

 genera, in which he has added to the 195 species before described, 

 90 hitherto unknown, or not supposed to belong to the family. The 

 author avows his intention of re-arranging all the botanical families ; 

 and if immense materials, indefatigable research, and acute observa- 

 tion be sufficient to enable him to do so successfully, he is sure to 

 triumph. If M. de Jussieu's theory of organization be open to some 

 doubts, his efforts to dispel those doubts have been highly advan- 

 tageous to science, as they have elicited a number of curious and 

 authentic observations on the floral organs of the Malpighia and 

 kindred families. 



