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Xll. Description of a ncto Genus belonging to the Natural Familij 

 of Plants called Scrophularinic. Bi/ Mr. David Don, Libr. L.S. 



Head March 'II, 1826. 



The discovery of new generic forms is always a subject of great 

 importance in a natural system, as they tend to throw light on 

 the affinities of those groups already known to us, and conse- 

 quently to give us more enlarged views of the beauty and ad- 

 vantages of the natural classilication. ^Vhat renders the pre- 

 sent genus still more interesting is its partaking of the characters 

 of two very distinct natural orders. Possessing all the essential 

 marks of the Scrophularina, it agrees also with Jacaranda, a 

 genus belonging to the Bignoniacea, in the form and covering 

 of its seeds. This new genus I propose to denominate Lopho- 

 spermitm, a name compounded of XoÇoc a crest, and a-Tn^f^oc. seed, 

 in allusion to the form of its seeds. It consists at [present of 

 only two species, both natives of Mexico, where they were dis- 

 covered by the Spanish botanists Sessé and Mocinno, in whose 

 herbarium tiie one is marked Besleria scandens, and the other 

 Scrophularia physalodes,- — names, no doubt, vaguely given them 

 at the time of collecting by the discoverers, of whose zeal and 

 knt)\vledge ample testimony is aftbrded by the extensive collec- 

 tions which they made in that interesting country. In a natural 

 series our genus must be placed near to Maurandia and An- 

 tirrhinum. Its afKnity to the former is shown by its calyx and 

 capsules ; but its compressed, tuberculated, winged seeds, and 



the 



