208 BENTHAM ON THE GENUS HARPALYCE. 



XVII On the Genus Harpalyce. By George Bentham, 



Esq, F.L.S., &C.5 &c., Sic. 



Among the Leguminosce collected by Mr Gardner in the 

 Province of Ceara, is a very handsome red-fiowered peren- 

 nial, in which the structure of the flower is so peculiar, and 

 so unlike any hitherto described Brazilian genus, that Mr 

 Gardner, in sending it home with the No. 1548, thought 

 himself justified in considering it as a new one, and requested 

 that he might be allowed to dedicate it to his friend Mr 

 Bowman. 



On receiving my set, I immediately recognised this plant 

 as one which I had examined and obtained specimens ot 

 when at Vienna in the winter of 1836-7, from the rich Bra- 

 zilian collections of the late Dr Pohl. I then characterized 

 it as new, but unable to satisfy myself as to its affinities, de- 

 ferred the publication of my genus. On my return to this 

 country I received it again from the Imperial Academy of 

 St Petersburgh, and was about to insert a note upon it in my 

 account of Mr Schomburgk's Guiana Leguminosce^ when the 

 second parcel of Martius's " Herbarium Flora Braziliensis" 

 reached me, containing the same plant under the No. 587; 

 and the fear of adding another to the numerous Leofuminous 

 genera published under two names at the same time by dif- 

 ferent authors, has deterred me from noticing it, although it 

 occurs again amongst Claussen's LeguminoscB, which I owe 

 to the kindness of M. Delessert, and which I have under- 

 taken to name ; and much as I should be desirous of com- 

 plying with the wishes of so zealous and intelligent a collec- 

 tor as Mr Gardner, I should still have thought it better to 

 wait till I could ascertain whether it has or has not been 

 named by Dr Martius, were I not now persuaded that it 

 belongs to a genus already published, but which it is not 

 likely any botanist should refer it to, unless led to it as I veas 

 in some measure by mere chance. 



In studying the characters of the Leguminous " Genera non 

 satiS nota," with a view to a nreneral arrangement of the 



