BOTANY or TKRRA AUSTRALIS. 49 



may be called tlie type of Monocotyledones, that is, a regu- 

 lar flower with ternary division of its envelope, stamina, 

 and cells or placentae of the fruit. 



I have attempted a similar approximation of true Scita- 

 VLincci'} whose processes crowning the ovarium, and usually 

 two in number, form the complement of tlie stamina. 



]\[arantcce or CamiecB," an order at present referred to :575 

 Scitamineae, may also be reduced to this type ; they differ, 

 however, from Scitaminesc in the mutual relation of their 

 barren and fertile stamina, somewhat as Cypripedium does 

 from the other genera of Orchideae ; except that in Maranteae 

 the imperfection is greater, a single lobe only of one of the 

 lateral stamina having the appearance of an anthera and 

 producing pollen. 



It is remarkable that so very few Orchideae of Terra 

 Australis belong to that section of the order with angular 

 ela^ic pollen and adnate anthera ; this section being not 

 only the most numerous in Europe, but existing in an equal 

 proportion, though singularly modified, at the Cape of 

 Good Hope. 



Of another section of the order, formerly comprehended 

 under the Linnean genus Epidendriun, most of which, 

 though not properly parasitical, grow upon trees, several 

 species, chiefly belonging to Dendrobium, are found in New 

 Holland. In the northern hemisphere very few plants of 

 this section that grow on trees have been observed beyond 

 the tropic. The only exceptions to this, that I am acquainted 

 with, consist of two sj^cies of a genus related to Dendro- 

 bium, discovered by Dr. Buchanan, in Upper Nepaul ;^ 

 of Bendrohiiuii vioiiiUformc, observed by Kacmpfer and 

 Thunberg, in Japan, near Nagasaki; and of Ejndcndrum 

 conopseum,^ which, according to ]Mr. William Eartram, 

 groAvs in East Elorida, in lat. ;2b° N. 



In some parts of the southern hemisphere this section 

 appears to have a more extensive range. On the east 

 coast of New Holland several species of Dendrobium and 



» Prodr.Jl. Nov. Jloll. 305. _ ^ = Loc. cilat. 307. 

 ^ Ejiidcndruni prjeeox and Ejiidniulrum Immilc. Smith cxot. hot. tahb. 07 

 and 98. " Jlort. Kcic, cJ. 2, vol. 5, p. 219. 



