DE CANDOLLE'S NEW MONOGRAPHS. 249 



and Australia with New Zealand, and a single species in Chili. 

 It is not a prepossessing family, and presents peculiar diffi- 

 culties to the systematist, on account of the dioecious character 

 of most of them, and a striking difference between the plants 

 of the two sexes, which in collections are hard to match. 

 Much praise is due to Dr. Masters for his great labor, patience, 

 and skill. The latter half of the volume is occupied by Casi- 

 mir De CandoUe with his neat revision of the Meliacece, 

 chiefly a tropical order. The stamineal tube in the monadel- 

 phous Jfeliacece is concluded to be a staminiferous disk. The 

 Smilacece by Alphonse De CandoUe form the smaller but to 

 us the most interesting part of the volume. 



This order is restricted to three genera : two of them dicE- 

 cious, Heterosmilax with united sepals, no petals, and three 

 monadelpbous stamens (east Asiatic), Smilax with separate 

 sepals, petals, and (6-15) stamens ; the third, Rhipogonum 

 (of New Zealand and Australia), with hermaphrodite flowers. 

 Of Smilax one hundred and eighty-six species are character- 

 ized, and a dozen or two more are obscure or doubtful. There 

 are thirty-eight pages of prefatory generalia, in De Candolle's 

 best manner. We are pleased to find that he keeps up the 

 sjjecific phrase., and with true Linnsean curtness, relegating all 

 particulars, not truly diagnostic under the sections and other 

 divisions, to the description. In discussing the nature and 

 characters of the leaf (which in its general sense is called 

 "recentement et assez inutilement phyllome") the morphology 

 of the petiolar tendrils has to be considered ; the conclusion 

 is that these answer rather to leaflets than to stipules, and the 

 articulation, in some species well marked, between the blade 

 and the petiole, or in the petiole, is noted as supplying good 

 specific characters, which have been overlooked. The umbels 

 are centrifugal or cymose. To distinguish, as is here done, 

 the perianth into sepals and petals and to use these names 

 when practicable, is most proper ; but it hardly follows that 

 the term perianth or perigone will then have no raison d'etre. 

 Whatever the number and position of the stamens, the carpels 

 are superposed to the sepals, as indeed is the case in most 

 Monocotyledons. It is pertinently noted that in Smilax, 



