4.22 Mr. J. Miers on Ephedra. 
Gnetum, in regard to the affinity of which genus he offered no 
opinion. 
Richard (in 1810) * placed Ephedra in Conifere, followmg 
Salisburia in his tribe Taxinee; but he made no mention of 
Gnetum. 
Mirbel (in the same year) + gave Ephedra a similar position : 
he, too, seemed to ignore the relationship of Gnetum. 
Robert Brown (in 1814), speaking of Conifere, and referring 
to the view of Mirbel that the female fructification is a pistillum 
with a perforated style, observed that this argument “is derived 
from the genus Ephedra, in which both the stigma and a con- 
siderable part of the style project beyond this cupula (peri- 
carpium), without cohering with its aperture; and in confirma- 
tion of this opinion it may be observed that I have found a pro- 
jection of the stigma, though certainly in a much less obvious 
degree, both in Agathis and Podocarpus.” It is evident that 
this great botanist at that time had a very imperfect knowledge 
of the real structure of Hphedra; for he then considered the 
pericarp to be a modified disk, and the integuments of the seed 
to be the pistillum. At a later period, however (in 1825) §, in 
his celebrated memoir on Kingia, remarking upon Cycadacee 
and Conifere, he corrected his former opinion, having noticed 
that its supposed style is in reality the elongated tubular apex 
of the seminal integument. 
Blume (in 1834) ||, in establishing the family of the Gnetacee, 
where he first associated Gnetum with Ephedra, gave a novel 
and, to my mind, the truest interpretation of the ordinal struc- 
ture and affinities of this small group: to his opinions I will 
presently refer. It is to be regretted that his views in regard to 
the nature of its several structural parts have not been adopted 
by subsequent botanists, who have greatly mystified the subject 
by employing different sorts of nomenclature for the several 
floral and seminal parts, in order to accommodate these expres- 
sions to their notion of the close affinity of the Gnetacee with 
Conifere and Cycadacee, and to the doctrine of naked seeds, as 
applied to those families. 
Dr. Lindley (in 1836)4 placed the Gnetacee among Gymno- 
sperms, next to Cycadacee and Conifere, but at the same time 
confessed that, having examined dried seeds of Gnetum, he felt 
inclined to favour the view of Blume, whose opinion he quoted 
at length, showing that the Gnetacee possess a far higher degree 
of organization, tending to a much nearer approach to Casuarina 
than to either Conifere or Cycadacee. 
* Ann. Mus. xvi. p. 297. t Ib. p. 458. 
t Gen. Rem. p. 572. § Append. King’s Voy. p. 64. 
|| Ann. Se. Nat. 2 sér. ii. p. 101. { Introd. Bot. p. 311. 
