192 



upon the essential organs of the flower, viz., stamens and pistils, 

 and was dealt with accordingly by Linna;us in creating his 

 Classes and Orders of the vegetable kingdom. 



Compositte occupied Class xix — Syngenesia, a name signify- 

 ing growing together, as seen by the anthers forming a ring, 

 or tube, in all the CompositEB. After Linna3us, A, P, De 

 Candolle of Geneva began a botanical work called, De Candolle's 

 Prodromus, which included all the known plants from time to 

 time up to 1880, containing principally Dicotyledonous plants, 

 and in which division is included the order under notice this 

 evening. Our present knowledge of botany informs us, how- 

 ever, hoAV useless it is to expect one man to know every living 

 plant, and in consequence modern botany divides itself into sections, 

 the leaders in which take precedence in the study of certain 

 natural orders, or genera. Bentham and Hooker commenced 

 their Genera Plantarum in 1860 (a work Avhich is regarded by all 

 British botanists, and most American, as the standard classifica- 

 tion of the present day) andfinished it in 1880, covering a period 

 of twenty years. Upon their natural system of classification 

 is based the present paper, Compositaj, as now recognized, 

 is the largest of all natural orders in the vegetable kingdom, 

 but it is more common in temperate than in tropical lands. In 

 Grisebach's Flora of the British West India Islands the author 

 has adopted the word Synantherete instead of Composita;, as 

 used by Bentham and Hooker. Owing to the fact that the 

 flowers of the Composite family are grouped together on a 

 common receptacle, the word Composita; is r;sed. The corolla 

 consists, as it were, of one petal, upon which are placed the 

 stamens inside the corolla tube. This order is grouped in 

 Avhat is known as the gamopetalous division of the Dicotyledons. 

 Herbacaous and shrubby plants are the rule, and those of tree- 

 like demensions the exception. Notable exceptions are the 

 tree-like Senecios of Jamaica, and Ollganthes condensata, 

 Schultz Bip, a tree of medium proportions, which is to be met 

 with pretty frequently in the St, Ann's neighbourhood of 

 this colonv and at the Botanic Gardens a small tree (StifFtia 

 chrysantha, Milk) from the Brazils, belonging to this order, 

 may be seen growing in the flower garden. 



The Compositse is a well defined order, and one that can 

 quickly be grasped, in spite of the very large number of plants 

 — some 10,000 — therein contained, thus contrasting in favour 

 of the tyro with themajority of orders. The princij^al characteristics 

 of Composita; are the flowers grouped together on a common re- 

 ceptacle, and the, whole enclosed within a chaffy envelope, synge- 

 nesious anthers, and 1 -seeded achenes. The envelope technically 

 known as the involucre is found to differ very materially in some 



