Prof. G. Gulliver on the Raphides of Isnardia. 263 



per paria 4-6, decussatim oppositis, et basi nexis, crebre im- 

 bricatis; perigonio 2-labiato, involucello 2-plo longiore, la- 

 biis adpressis, rotundatis ■ antheris 5, globosis, in columnam 

 exsertam crebriter sessilibus. — Patagonia ; v. s. in herb. Hook, 

 et Mus. Brit., Port Desire (Darwin). 



A stunted shrub, apparently not more than 4 inches in height, 

 with a repent caudex, out of which the somewhat ascendent 

 branches originate, which immediately divide themselves at every 

 half-inch distance into verticillated ramifications round each 

 axil, the ultimate ones being floriferous, with a pair of short 

 vaginant bractiform leaflets round each node, and a similar sti- 

 puloid sheath round the base of each ramification. They are all 

 of a dull reddish orange- colour. The male spikelets are ovate, 

 2 lines long*. 



XXVIII. — On the Raphides of Isnardia. 

 By Prof. Gulliver. 



Having, through the kindness of Mr. W. H. Baxter, of the 

 Oxford Botanic Garden, received a fragment of a few leaves of 

 an old dried specimen of Isnardia palustris, I have examined it, 

 and find that, like its congeners Epilobium, (Enothera, and 

 Circcea, it abounds in true raphides. They were easily detected, 

 in the form of bundles, under a magnifying power of about 

 one hundred and sixty, linear admeasurement, in bits of the 

 leaf which had been macerated in water ; and the needle-like 

 crystals were also separately diffused through the water in which 

 the leaf had been comminuted. This plant was the only one 

 required to complete the series of observations on British 

 Onagracese formerly made by me; and now it is certain that 

 raphides are abundant and of similar shape in all our genera 

 of this order. How well it is thus characterized may at once 

 be seen by comparing a portion of Epilobium with a like part of 

 Lythrum, when the profusion of raphides in the one plant and 

 their absence in the other will plainly show the difference. 

 This observation, in connexion with others given in the 'An- 

 nals ' for January last, pp. 13-15, would appear to warrant the 

 following conclusions : — 



1. Raphides form a regular part of the healthy, growing, or 

 perfect structure of several plants — from the ovary to mature 

 parts, as stem, leaves, sepals, and testa, — contrary to the state- 

 ment of Schleiden that " crystals are rarely met with in cells in 

 a full state of vitality." 



2. Crystals resulting merely from chemical changes connected 



* A representation of this plant will be given in Plate 79 b. 



