46 Mr. J. Miers on the Tricuspidariese. 



Symh. iii. 67; — Dicera? serrata, Forst, Prodr. 221 ) DC. 

 Frodr. i. 520 j A. Rich. Fl. Nov. Zel. 304 : — Aristotelia ra- 

 cemosa, Hook. fit. Fl. N. Zel. i. p. 33. — In Nova Zelandia. 



3. Friesia fruticosa ; — Aristotelia t'ruticosa, Hook.fil. I.e. p. 34. 

 — In Nova Zelandia. 



4. Friesia Ghinensis^ Gardn. & Champ, in Hook. Kew Joum. 

 i. 243. — In ins. Hong Kong. 



3. Vallea. 



This genuSj proposed by Mutis, was first established by 

 Linnaeus, in the Supplement to his ' Systema.' Its floral 

 characters were figured and described in the ' Flora Peruviana ;' 

 and the genus was afterwards better illustrated by Kunth. 

 Most botanists have placed Vallea in the Elonocarpem -^ but 

 the authors of the new ' Genera Plantarum ' have arranged it 

 in their tribe Sloanem^ on account of the '' subligneous muri- 

 cated capsule." But there is very little resemblance in the 

 pericarp of this genus to that of Stoanea and its allied genera, 

 where, m a dry capsular fruit, the valves are thick, ligneous, 

 and densely covered with long spines or rigid hairs. It is not 

 correct to say that the pericarp of Vallea is muricated'j on 

 the contrary, the fruit is baccate, the mesocarp being thick, 

 soft, and fleshy, covered by a thin membranaceous epicarp, 

 which is corrugated in the form of many fleshy obtuse tuber- 

 cles ; this dries upon the testaceous endocarp after the fall of 

 the fruit, when it becomes imperfectly dehiscent at its summit. 

 I have seen the fruit in an unripe state only, when the seeds 

 have not been sufficiently perfected to ascertain the nature of 

 the integuments ; but a longitudinal section through the centre 

 shows that the edges of the dissepiments are firmly aggluti- 

 nated upon a solid central column that rises to three-quarters 

 of the length of the cells, the remaining upper portions being- 

 separated by a hollow space ; and it is this which limits the 

 small extent of the apical dehiscence of the fruit when it be- 

 comes quite dried. This structure is analogous to that in 

 Tricuspidaria ; but there the axile column scarcely rises above 

 the base ; so that the edges of the dissepiments, being un- 

 restrained, admit of a considerable extent of divarication of the 

 valves. In Aristotelia this central column rises to two-thirds 

 of the length of the cell ; but the endocarp is of too thin a 

 texture to give sufficient elasticity to the parts, after they be- 

 come dried, to cause its dehiscence. It will appear, therefore, 

 that Vallea ought to stand close to Aristotelia^ as it possesses 

 all the essential characters of the Elceocarjpeoi : it has the calyx 

 and petals of Friesia^ a disk very different from any of the 

 bhaneoij the stamens, ovary, style, and stigma as in Aristo- 



