334 THE TONGA PLANT (EPIPKEMNUM MIRABILE, SCHOTT). 



looked in the genus Epipremnum, in 1878, for Mr. Bull's plant, I 

 did not match it. On looking up the original description of R. 

 lacera, I find that this species is the type of the genus Bhaphido- 

 plwra, Hassk., and was published in two places by Hasskarl, in the 

 year 1842, viz., in the ' Tidjschrift,' ix., p. 168, and in the ' Flora,' 

 1842, ii., Bieblatter, p. 11 ; in both places reference is made to 

 Hasskarl's ' Catalogus Plantarum in Horto Botanico Bogoriensi,' 

 but that work was not published until 1844, although the MSS. of 

 it had been sent long previously. Hasskarl has also described the 

 plant at greater length in his ' Plantge Javanic^ Eariores,' p. 155, 

 published in 1848. In the first three works quoted, Hasskarl 

 describes the ovary as '' one-celled, one-ovuled," but in the book 

 last-mentioned this is altered to " two-celled, with two ovules in 

 each cell." In both cases Hasskarl was wrong, for there can, I 

 think, be no possible doubt that the plant described by Hasskarl 

 as Rhaphidophora lacera, is the same as Epiprenmuw mirabile, Schott, 

 and that Hasskarl must have failed to make out the true structure 

 of the ovary. Had he been right in either case the genus would 

 not liave been a new one, as the character of having a one-celled, 

 one-ovuled ovary would make the plant a Schidapsus, and that 

 of two-celled, with two ovules in each cell, a Monstera. The true 

 and normal structure of the ovary I have already described. 

 Besides the above errors in his characters of the genus, Hasskarl 

 unfortunately quotes as a synonym of E. lacera, the Pathos pertusa, 

 Koxb., and from this circumstance no doubt the confusion of the 

 genus has arisen ; for Schott took Futhos pertusa, Eoxb., as the 

 type of Hasskarl's genus, FJiaphidopiJwra (see ' Bonplandia,' 1857, v., 

 p. 45), though there is every reason to believe that Hasskarl never 

 saw Roxburgh's Pothos pertusa, since in the ' Tijdschrift ' he 

 quotes it doubtfully as a synonym of R. lacera, ('* an Pothos pertusa, 

 Eoxb., i., 455 ?"), ; and if he had seen and examined it he could 

 never have failed to note that Pothos pertusa differed from his plant 

 in having a two-celled ovary with axile placentas and numerous 

 ovules, as correctly described by Schott, though the latter was at 

 the same time wrong in considering that plant as the type of the 

 genus Rhaphidojdwra. It is somewhat singular that Schott should 

 have perceived that Hasskarl had (by placing Pothos pertusa, Eoxb., 

 as a synonym) confused two plants under his R. lacera, since 

 Schott quotes R. lacera partly as a synonym of R. pertusa, Schott 

 (' Prod. Aroid.,' p. 382), and partly as a synonym of Epipremnum 

 mirahile Schott (' Prod. Aroid,' p. 389), and yet not have perceived 

 that the character given for the genus Rhaphidophora and the 

 description of R. lacera did not at all agree with Pothos pertusa, Eoxb., 

 whilst they very nearly agree with the plant Schott called 

 Epipremnum mirahile. It is still more remarkable that Schott, who 

 was usually a very acute and accurate observer, should twice have 

 placed this plant in the genus Rhaplddophora, as he understood it, 

 without noticing that it was identical with his E pipremnum mirahile ; 

 possibly he did not dissect the specimens, or failed to make out 

 their structure, for the ovaries of this group of Aroids are very 

 difficult to dissect in a di'ied state, requiring no small stock 



