Mr. J. Miers on Goupia. 289 
XXXI.—On Goupia. By Joun Mimrs, F.R.S., F.LS. &e. 
Tue place which this little-known genus should occupy in the 
system has not yet been satisfactorily established, although its 
typical species was described and figured by Aublet (Pl. Guy. i. 
296, tab. 116) more than eighty years ago. Willdenow con- 
sidered it to belong to the <Araliacee. Jussieu placed it in 
Rhamnacee—a view that was afterwards adopted by most bota- 
nists. Endlicher, however, classed it among the dubious genera 
of Celastracee, which opinion was followed by Dr. Lindley in 
his ‘ Vegetable Kingdom’ (p. 588). All these conclusions were 
founded on the drawing and description of Aublet, as no other 
botanist up to that time appears to have examined the genus. 
Mr. Bentham, however (in 1852), gave more ample details of its 
floral structure (Kew Journ. Bot. iv. 11), on which he founded 
an emended generic character. Notwithstanding the many inter- 
esting facts there communicated, he regarded its position in the 
system as still uncertain: he remarked that the alternation of 
the stamens with the petals favoured the opinion of its affinity 
with the Celastracee ; but he considered that the structure of 
the ovary brought it nearer to the Biittneriacee, because it is 
crowned by five divaricated styles and its ovules are affixed to 
the axis of a 5-celled ovary. Recently (in 1861) Dr. Reisseck 
(in Mart. Flor. Bras. xxviii. p. 34) gives his opinion positively that 
Goupia differs in no respect from the Biittneriacee, except in its 
baccate fruit, and that its immediate affinity is with the Biite- 
nerie@ and Theobromee: though speaking so decidedly, he can- 
not have examined the structure of the genus, as otherwise, I 
am convinced, he could not have come to this conclusion. 
With all the respect due to so distinguished an authority as 
Mr. Bentham, I beg to suggest that Goupia offers very slender 
claims of affinity towards the Biittneriacee. My reasons are 
founded on the alternate (not opposite) position of the stamens 
with regard to the petals; that they are all free and isomerous, 
without any tendency to become monadelphous or to be double 
the number of the petals; its anthers are introrse (not extrorse), 
and the zestivation of the petals is strictly valvate (not convolutely 
imbricate) ; to which may be added, the umbellated disposition 
of its axillary flowers. This eminent botanist considered that 
the anthers are sessile upon the margin of a monadelphous sta- 
minal tube, whereas I have noticed that they are perfectly free, 
being furnished with distinct filaments,’in no way connected to- 
gether, and seated round the ovary within a cupular disk, as in 
Calypso campestris, Camb., and in Hippocratacee*. 
Before I proceed to indicate what I conceive to be the real 
* St.-Hil, Flor. Bras. i. 3, tab, 104, 
