Mr. J. Miers on some genera of the Icacinaceae. 109 



linear: the differences in regard to their relative length and breadth 

 are probably only specific, as we find them to occur in Stemonurus. 

 After desiccation, the flowers oiPhlebocalymna appear of an orange 

 colour, which is probably retained from the living state ; they 

 are somewhat more transparent and agglutinated at their edges 

 than in Stemonurus, the calyx is more distinctly 5-lobed, and the 

 segments are imbricated in sestivation, a feature also recorded by 

 Blume in his character ofPlatea : in Griffiths^s plant from Mergui, 

 the calyx is furnished at its base, at the point of its articulation 

 with the pedicel, with a distinct bract. In this plant, and in 

 another from Moulmein, the flowers are axillary, and almost fas- 

 ciculated in a very short raceme, but in Cuming's plant from 

 Manilla, the inflorescence is in a spreading panicle, with numerous 

 flowers upon lengthened pedicels. Blume, in his generic cha- 

 racter of Flatea, states that the flowers are dioecious, and that in 

 the female flowers the corolla and stamens are altogether wanting. 

 The same might almost be said of several species of Stemonurus, 

 for as soon as the fertility of the ovarium is clearly discernible, 

 the petals and stamens will be found to have fallen ofl", and from 

 analogy we may safely conclude the same to have occurred in 

 Platea. Mr. Griffiths in his manuscript note on Phlebocalymna 

 says, " genus novum Icacinearum, familia singularis ob albumen 

 in lobos divaricatos et tegumen seminis vasculosissimum : " this 

 remark can hardly apply to his proposed genus, of which it does 

 lot appear that he had seen the seed, and it is more than pro- 

 iblc that the allusion was made to Bursinopetalum, a genus 

 laced by Dr. Wight (Icon. tab. 956) in the Olacacete, of which 

 le Icacinea had been universally held to be a tribe : in that 

 jenus, by the growth of the placentary column of the abortive 

 ells, and its protrusion into the cavity of the fertile cell, the 

 Ibumen becomes hippocrepically folded, and somewhat divided 

 ito two lobes, in the manner clearly demonstrated in the figure 

 eferred to. I have elsewhere shown that Bursinopetalum belongs 

 the Aquifoliace(B. Blume in his ' Mus. Bot. Lugd.' gives a 

 lew generic character of Platea : this will require some modifica- 

 ion, if we include in it Phlebocalymna, and with this view I 

 now offer the following diagnosis ; — 



Platea, Blume. Phlebocalymna, GriffitJis. — Flores hermaphro- 

 diti vel Sfcpissime abortu polygami : an unquam vere dioici ? 

 Calyx brevissimus, cupularis, 5-dentatus, dentibus in prajflora- 

 tionem imbricatis, persistens, scd non augescens. Petala 5, 

 linearia, carnosula, sestivatione valvata, apice propendenti in- 

 flexo, margin ibus rorido-glandulosis, imo in tubum laxe ad- 

 hjerentibus, e medio libera et reflexa, in flor. fern, fertil. cito 

 dccidua. Stamina 5, cum petalis inserta, iisdem alterna, fila- 



