Mr. J. Miers on the Tricuspidariez. 39 
VI.—On the Tricuspidariex, a Subtribe of the Eleocarpee. 
By Joun Miers, F.R.S., F.L.S., &c. 
Tue Eleocarpee, as a natural order distinct from Tiliacee, 
was proposed in 1808 by Jussieu, who united with it the 
Tricuspidaria and Vallea of the ‘ Flora Peruviana.’ Kunth, 
in 1821, followed this example; but, in a note, he suggested 
that it might well form a distinct tribe of the Tiliacee. De 
Candolle, in 1821, adopted the view of Jussieu, adding to the 
list Prdesta and others now subgenera of H/e@ocarpus. Lindley, 
in 1836, in his ‘ Nat. Syst.,’ followed a similar course ; but in 
1845, in his ‘ Veget. Kingd.,’ he adopted the hint suggested 
by Kunth, uniting the family with Ti/iacee as a distinct tribe. 
The authors of the new ‘ Genera Plantarum,’ in 1862, followed 
this arrangement under some modifications, excluding Vallea 
upon very insufficient data, and amalgamating Firdesta with 
Avistotelia and Orinodendron with Tricuspidarta upon slender 
‘grounds. After a careful examination of these several genera, 
I am led to follow the views of Endlicher in maintaining the 
Tricuspidarie as a subtribe distinct from Eleocarpee, which 
are distinguished from one another by very salient and con- 
stant characters. In the former the petals, though three-lobed 
at the apex or nearly entire, are never fringed as in the E/l@o- 
carpee ; in the latter the fruit is a drupe, with a single thick 
osseous mesocarp, assuming the shape of an indehiscent tuber- 
culated nut, which, by abortion, is seldom more than 1- or 2- 
celled, each cell producing a single seed (not suspended from 
the summit, as generally stated, but) appended by the middle 
of its ventral face. On the other hand, the Tricuspidaria, 
besides the difference in the form of the petals, have a fruit 
always 3—5-celled, with two or more superposed seeds in 
each cell, and either capsular and dehiscent or else baccate 
with a membranous endocarp. But a still more forcible dis- 
tinction exists in the nature of the integuments of the seeds. 
In the Eleocarpee the outer integument is chartaceous, thin, 
and brittle, the second tunic being submembranaceous ; but 
there is no osseous coat. In the Zricuspidariew the seeds in- 
variably have three tunics: the outer one is thick and fleshy, 
in which the chord of the raphe is imbedded; the second coat 
is thick, osseous, obpyriform, truncated at its base, where, 
beneath the chalaza, there is always a distinct chamber, into 
which the vessels of the raphe find their way ; the third tunic 
is opaque, somewhat membranaceous, with a large orbicular 
chalaza at its base, corresponding with the chalazal base of the 
bony tunic. No structure of this kind is seen in the Hl@o- 
carpe ; but it is constant in all the Tricuspidariee. An ana- 
