97 



REVISION OF THE AEEICAN SPECIES OF ERIOSEMA. 

 By Edmund G. Bakkr, F.L.S. 



The first mention of Erioscnia is in DeCandolle's Prodromus 

 (ii. 888 (1825)). It there constitutes a section of the genus 

 lihijnchusia, although there is a note saying that it may be a good 

 genus intermediate between Ehijnchosia and Flemini/ia. The sec- 

 tional chiiracters given are as follows: — "Foliis brevissime petio- 

 latis, I'oliolis nunc 3 unijugis cum imparl, nunc 3 fere ex eodem 

 puncto ortis, nunc solitariis. Racemi aut fasciculi fiorum axillares. 

 Vexillum sericeo-villosum. Caules non scandentes." Eight species 

 are enumerated, but, with the single exception of U. psoraloUlcs DC, 

 from Madagascar, they are from the New World. 



Desvaux {Arm. Sc. Nat. Ser. 1, ix. 421 (1826)) was the first to 

 give Erioseina generic rank. It is there spelt, however, Euriostna, 

 but there can be no doubt of the identity of the two, as he gives a 

 diagnostic character, and also refers to it as a division of the 

 lihynchosiiB established by DeCandolle. Three species are here 

 given^E". sessUifiora {lihijnchosia sessiliflora DC. I.e. 389), from the 

 Antilles; E. cmjentea [Podahjria trifoliata Willd. I.e. 504, from the 

 Cape, which is now Anjijrolobium sericeum E. & Z.) ; and E. harhata, 

 from Peru. 



Reicheubach, in his Conspectus (1828), 150, is, I think, the first 

 who adopts the spelling of Erioserna now accepted, and uses the 

 name generically. In 1832, E. Meyer, in Linniea (vii. 171), pub- 

 lished a species from the Cape, E. dtnjsoposta, which has since been 

 referred to PJujnchosia ; and in 1835 he published the first portion 

 of his Coiiimentanj on the South African plants collected by Drege, 

 in which nine species are described ; some of these have since been 

 relegated to other genera. In 1836 the portion of Ecklon and 

 Zeyher's Enumeration containing the Leguminosm appeared ; in this 

 two species are described for the first time, E. pubendum and E. 

 sericeum, but neither of these is included in Eriusema in Harvey 

 and Sonder's Flora Capensis. 



Meisner, in his ' Contributions towards a Flora of South Africa ' 

 [London Journal of Botany, ii. 91 (1843) ), published one new 

 species, E. Kraussianum. The other species which are referred 

 to in this paper have been described for the most part eitber in 

 A. Richard's Tent. EL Abijssinica, Hooker's Ni(jer Flora, Peters' 

 Mossambique, or the Flora of Tropical Africa, 



Welwitsch [Apontamentos, 573 (1858)) founds a new genus, 

 Muxiria, on a plant collected on the banks of the river Cuanza, 

 near Mopope, in the Pungo Andongo district of Angola, which he 

 names il/". utilis. It is a shrub with yellow or sometimes blue 

 flowers, having a densely hairy calyx, but with the biovulate pods 

 of Eriosema. I have followed my father in reducing it to this genus. 



Eriosema is so nearly allied to PiJujnchosia on the one hand, and 

 Flemivf/ia on the other, that it seems advisable to recapitulate the 

 characters at somewhat greater length. 



Journal of Botany. — Vol. 83. [April, 1895.] h 



