oa 
374 Rafinesque on the Genus Floerkea. 
wrong; but I mnst notice before, that no botanist had I be- 
lieve endeavored to class it naturally, until Mr. Correa de 
Serra, who in his reduction of American genera to the natural 
families of Jussieu, attempted without having had an opportu- 
nity to see the plant, to place it in the family of Juncz, taking 
it therefore to be a monocotyle plant; being led into this er- 
ror by a mistaken idea, that all hexandrous plants must be 
monocotyle! But in the spring of 1816, 1 found this plant in 
the neighborhood of Philadelphia, near the falls of the 
Schuylkill) where it had escaped the attention of all the bo- 
tanists of that city, and in particular of Dr. William Barton, 
who has therefore omitted it in his Prodr. fl. Philad. and hay- 
ing communicated it to Mr. Correa, he acknowledged that it 
was dicotyle, of which fact I was aware, even before seeing 
the plant and dissecting its seed, by attending to its habit. 
The following exact description of this genus will enable 
the reader to ascertain how far I am correct in my presump- 
tions towards its natural arrangement. 
Floerkea. Perigone double persistent, sixpartite; the exte- 
rior calicinal 3 partile, sepals acute; the interior shorter, 
central and bifid style, two capitated stigmas. Fruit a bilobed 
atricule, tuberculated and bilocular dispermous, sometimes 
round, unilocular and monospermous by abortion of one lobe 
and cell. Seeds attached to the centre near the bottom, nearly 
lenticular, smooth albuminous, easily divided in two lobes. 
Habit. Small, delicate, annual, and glabrous plant, ‘with alter- 
nate polytome pinnated leaves, flowers axillar, solitary, P& 
dunculated. 
Floerkea uliginosa. Caule tenello flaccido erecto simplex, 
foliis 4 petiolatis imis ternatis, summis pinnato, quinatis, pinnu- 
lis lineari oblongis obtusis, integris floribus axillaris, solitaris 
pedunculis longis apice incrastatis. Stem delicate, soft, UP- 
right, and simple, leaves petiolated, the inferior ternated, the 
superior pinnated, quinate, pinnules linear-oblong obtuse, 
