APPENDIX. No. V. 441 



Five species belonging to this section of Violeae occur in Aublet's History 

 of the Plants of Guiana, where each of them is considered as forming a sepa- 

 rate genus. Of three of these genera, namely, Conohoria, Rinorea, and 

 Riana, the flowers alone are described ; the two others, Passura and Piparea, 

 were seen in fruit only. 



From the examination of flowers of Aublet's original specimens of the 

 three former genera, in Sir Joseph Banks's herbarium, and of the fruit of 

 Conolioria, which entirely agrees with that of Passura, and essentially with 

 that of Piparea, I have hardly a doubt of these five plants, notwithstanding 

 some differences in the disposition of their leaves, actually belonging to one 

 and the same genus : and as they agree with Physiphora in every respect, 

 except in the texture and form of the capsule, and \vith the Passalia of Sierra 

 Leone and Congo, except in having their stamina nearly or entirely distinct, 

 it appears that all these genera may be referred to Alsodeia. 



I have also examined, in Sir Joseph Banks's herbai-ium, a specimen of Pen- 

 taloba sessilis of the Flora Cochinchinensis, which was sent so named, by 

 Loureiro himself, and have found it to agree in every important point with 

 Alsodeia, even as to the number of parietal placentfe. Loureiro, however, 

 describes the fruit of Pentaloba as a five-lobed, five-seeded berry, and if 

 this account be correct, the genus ought to be considered as distinct ; but if, 

 which is not very improbable, the fruit be really capsular, it is evidently 

 referable to Alsodeia ; with the species of which, from Madagascar and the 

 west coast of equinoctial Africa, it agrees in the manifest union of its filaments. 



It appears therefore that the ten genera now enumerated, and perhaps also 

 Lauradia of Vandelli, may very properly be reduced to one ; and they all at 

 least manifestly belong to the same section of Violeae, though at present they 

 are to be found in various, and some rather distant, natural orders. 



M. de Jussieu, in adopting Aublet's erroneous description of the stamina of 

 Rinorea and Conohoria, has referred both these genera to Berberides,* to which 



*■ The genera belonging to Berberides are Berberis (to which Ilex Japonica of 

 Thunberg belongs); Leontice (including Caulophyllum, respecting which see Linn. Soe. 

 Transac. 12, p. 145) Epimedium : and Diphyllcia of Michaux. Jeffersonin may perhaps 

 differ in the internal structure of its seeds, as its does in their arillus, from true Berberi- 

 des, but it agrees with them in tlie three principal characters of llieir flower, namely, in 

 their stamina being etiual in number and opposite to the petals; in the remarkable 

 dehiscence of autherae; and in the structure of the o¥ariara. Pod-ophyllum agrees with 



3 L 



