NYCTAGINACE2E. 



13 



flower in the centre of three bracts. Bougainvillea consists of shrubs, 

 often sarmentose and thorny, 1 with simple, alternate exstipulate leaves. 

 Half a dozen species 2 have been described, all natives of the warm 

 regions of South America. 



B. de Jussieu 3 established an order Jalapcc in which he placed 

 with Pisonia, Boerhaavia and Mirabilis all the Plumb agin eat and 

 Amaranthem then known. Adanson 4 reduced the family of the Jalaps 

 to the above three genera. He only retained besides the genus 

 Plumbago, of which A. L. de Jussieu 5 made a special order, distinct 

 from tbat of the Nyctaginacece, to which he added the genus 

 B ugainvittea of Commerson. Lindley 6 who first gave to this family 

 the name of Nyctaginacea, united therein, like Endlicher/ eleven of 

 the genera that we know at present, that is to say, besides those 

 already collected by A. L. de Jussieu, Abronia, Oxybaphus, Allionia, 

 Boldoa {Salpianthus), Reichcnbachia, CoUgnonia, and Olcenia. 8 

 Choisy who, in 1849, drew up for Prodromus the description of the 

 Nyctaginacea, established the new genus Nycfaginia, 9 to which four 

 years later A. Gray added PentacrojjJtys and Selinocarpus.™ The 

 fourteen genera which we have retained, include about a hundred 

 and twenty species, of which nearly a hundred belong to the warm 

 regions of the New World, extending from Mexico and the Southern 

 United States to Chili and La Plata. There are in Australia 

 but three Pisonias and two Boerhaavias which are found in all the 

 warm countries on the Globe. The warm regions of Oceania have 

 eight or ten Pisonias which are peculiar to them. There is a rather 



Cieno. Nat., v. 63, t. 40. — J., in Ann. Mus., 

 ii. 275.— Endl., Gen., n. 2007. — Chois., Prodr., 

 436. — Torreya Sprung., N. Enid., ii. 121 (ex 

 Endl., nee Aen., nee Rafin.) 



1 The simple or 2, 3-forked spines at the 

 summit represent, as in Pisonia, axillary branches 

 or floriferous peduncles, and may bear here 

 and there leaves, coloured bracts, and even 

 flowers. 



2 Poie., Diet., viii. 86; Suppl., v. 358 (Tri- 

 cycla).—W., Spec, ii. 348.— H. B. K., Nov. 

 Gen. et Spec, i. 173, t. 49. — Pees., JEnchirid., 

 i. 418.— ? Blanco, Fl. Filipp., 307. — Gaedn., 

 in Hook. Journ., i. 185. — Neuw., Meis. Bras., 

 i. 44, 91, 347 ; ii. 148. 



3 Ord. Nat. (1759), in A. L. Juss. Gen., 

 lxviii. 



4 Fara. des PI., ii. (1763), 263, fam. xxxvi.— 

 Nyctagineai J., in Ann, Mus., ii. 269. — Allio- 



niacece Hoe., Prim. Lin. Syst., 68. — Jalapinece 

 Batsch, Aff. 324. 



5 Gen. (1789), 90, Ord. 3. 



G Nat. Syst., ed. 2, 213; Veg. Kingd. (1S46), 

 506, Ord. 192. 



7 Gen., 310, Ord. 104. 



s Also Trieycla, Reichenbacliia, Neea, ascribed 

 respectively by us to the genera Bougainvillea, 

 Boldoa, and Pisonia, with Fpilitlies Bl., which 

 is a Serpicula. 



9 Also Quamoclidion, ascribed here to Mira- 

 bilis. 



10 Brief Char, of some new Gen. and Spec, 

 of Nyctagin., Princ Coll. in Texas and N. 

 Mexico (in Amer. Journ. of Sc, ser. 2, 1853.) 

 The Author also established in this paper, the 

 genus Acleianthus, which we join to Mirabilis 

 as the title of a section. 



