126 I'liOCEEDINGS OF THE NATIONAL MUSEUM. vol.54. 



This well-marked form is very suggestive of certain existing species 

 commonly referred to the genus Clematis, especially some of the sub- 

 tropical species sometimes referred to the genus Viorna Reichenbach. 

 As there are other genera in this family with similar fruits and the 

 material is not available for extended comparisons with recent South 

 American forms, it is referred to the form genus Carpolitlius. 



Holotype.— Cut. No. 35083, U.S.N.M. 



Order PAPAVERALES. 



Family CAPPARIDACEAE. 



Genus CAPPARIS Linnaeus. 



CAPPARIS MULTINERVIS EngeShardt. 



Plate 15, fig. 10. 



Capparis multinervis Engelhardt, Sitz. Naturw. Gesell. Isis in Dresden, 1894, 

 Abh. 1, p. 7, pi. 1, fig. 18. 



Description.— \j&QiY&s short petioled, linear, with an obtusely 

 rounded tip and a cimeate base. Margins entire. Texture coria- 

 ceous. Length 6 or 7 cm. Maximum width, midway between the 

 apex and the base, 7 to 12 mm. Petiole stout, curved, about 3 or 

 4 mm. in length. Midrib stout, straight except basally, where it is 

 curved, prominent on the lower surface of the leaf. Secondaries 

 numerous, widely but regularly spaced, stout and somewhat promi- 

 nent; 15 to 18 opposite to alternate pairs diverge from the midrib at 

 wide angles, sometimes as great as 75° in the median part of the leaf, 

 but averaging somewhat less generally; they are nearly straight and 

 subparallel in their outward course for three-fourths of the distance 

 to the margin, where they curve upward in a broad camptodrome 

 arch to join the secondary next above. The tertiaries are mostly 

 obsolete, occasionally they are seen but not sufficiently to determine 

 the areolation. 



A single specimen, somewhat larger than that figured by Engel- 

 hardt, is contained in the present collection. Gapparis, although with 

 usually well-marked characters of both form and venation, has a prac- 

 tically unknown geological history. An unquestionable species from 

 the lower Eocene of the southern United States^ is very similar to the 

 present species. A second and somewhat doubtfully determined 

 form was recorded by linger from the European Miocene. The 

 genus comprises about 100 existing species of shrubs and small 

 trees of the equatorial region and, although present in the Eastern 

 Hemisphere, the bulk of the forms occur in the American Tropics, 

 especially in Central and South America. The Potosi species is 



I Berry, E. W., Lower Eocene Floras of southeastern North America. U. S. Geol. Surv. Prof. Paper 91, 

 1916, p. 218, pi. 44, figs. 1-3; pi. 52, fig. 5. 



