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Amt. On the Hippocrateaceæ of South America. 
By qued Miers, F.R.S. $ L.S., Dignit. $ Commend. Ord. Imp. Bras. Rose, &c. &c. 
(Plates XVI.-X XXII.) 
Read June 1st, 1871. 
ALTHOUGH the family of the Hippocrateacee is one of considerable interest, its study 
has been much neglected by botanists, who have never clearly understood the limits of 
the groups they have proposed; nor have they succeeded in defining, under precise cha- 
racters, any single group; and hence the same species has often been referred first to one 
genus then to another, thus engendering a needless number of synonyms. As a natural 
result of this state of confusion, no alternative remained but the one adopted by the 
authors of the new *Genera Plantarum,' who, for want of reliable characters, reduced 
to two the number of genera in the family :—1. Hippocratea, including those species 
with capsular fruits and winged seeds; 2. Salacia, under which are associated all the 
species with drupaceous fruits and hard seeds. 
My attention was first directed to this family nearly forty years ago, during my resi- 
dence in Brazil. I then observed many new facts; I have since studied the subject 
from time to time; and having obtained a sufficient amount of evidence, I feel justified 
in proposing to restore and reform the several genera which have for a long while been 
discarded. "This inquiry has been hitherto confined to the plants of the New World, 
because I have had no convenient opportunities for examining sufficiently the Hippo- 
crateaceæ of the Eastern hemisphere. 
The history of the family may be reviewed in the order of the periods when botanists 
have examined its affinities and expressed their views under their limited knowledge 
of its structural organization. 
Jussieu, in 1789*, arranged Hippocratea near Acer; and on subsequently founding the 
Order Hippocrateacee, in 18117, he considered the former genus allied to the 4cerine 
on the one hand and to Malpighiacee on the other, but especially nearer to the latter, on 
account of its 3-locular winged capsules, and its disk prolonged into three stamens (the 
latter statement being far from correct). 
Robert Brown, in 18141, in first establishing the Order Celastraceæ upon some genera 
separated from Rhamnacee, considered it in many respects so nearly allied to Hippo- 
crateacee that he doubted whether they might not be united. Subsequently, in 1818$, 
he pointed out that the Hippocrateacee differed from the Malpighiacee in the mode of 
insertion of its ovules, on which same aecount he considered that a close alliance existed 
between the former and Celastracee, notwithstanding the difference in the number and 
mode of the insertion of the stamens and the absence of albumen in the seeds. 
*. Gen. Pl. p. 251. T Ann. Mus. xviii. 486. t Flind. Voy. 555. $ Congo, 427. 
2x2 
