XIV. 



On the Affinities of the Genus VAV^A, Benth. ; also of RHYTIDAXDRA, Gray. 



By ASA GRAY, M. D. 



{Communicated to the Academy, October 10, 1854.) 



Vavjja, a well-sounding name, formed from Vavao, one of the Friendly Islands, 

 where the plant in question was discovered by the late Mr. Hinds, was employed 

 Mr. Bentham to designate a genus, of obscure affinity, founded on a single incomplete 

 specimen, destitute of fruit.* No opinion as to its relationship was expressed, beyond 

 the remark that it is evidently allied to Ixionanthes of Jack, — itself a genus most im- 

 perfectly known, and the family to which it belongs having scarcely even been guessed 

 at. Vavcea Amicorum, Benth., the only species known, was likewise gathered by the 

 naturalists of the Exploring Expedition in the Pacific under Captain Wilkes, both at 

 the Friendly Islands (on Tongatabu) and at the Feejee Islands. In the first volume, 

 recently published, of the Botany of this Expedition,f I endeavored to illustrate this 

 genus, as far as could be done in the absence of ripe fruit and seeds (the former occur- 

 ring on one specimen in a state barely far enough advanced to show that the ovary 

 becomes a berry) ; and I ventured to append it to the order Meliacea, notwithstanding 

 the stamens of more than double (usually triple) the petals in number, and the in- 

 comxilete union of their filaments. 



I have now had the opportunity of examining one or two blossoms from additional 

 specimens, which clearly belong, I doubt not, to Vavcea Amicorum, although they differ 



* In Hooker's London Journal of Botany, 2. p. 212. 



t Botany of the United States Exploring Expedition under Captain Wilkes ; Piianerogamia, 1. p. 244, 

 tab. 16. 



VOL. V. NEW SERIES. 45 



