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XXVI. On the Conantheree. By JOHN Miers, Esq., F.R.S. ¥ L.S. 
(Plate LIII.) 
Read June 2nd, 1864. 
A PAPER by Dr. Leybóld was read before the Linnean Society in January 1863, and 
published in * Seemann's Journal’ for that month, proposing a new order of Monocoty- 
ledonee under the title of the Tecophileacee. At the request of Dr. Seemann, I communi- 
cated some remarks on this subject, which he printed in his Journal for March following 
(p.92). I then stated that the typical plant upon which this order was proposed had 
been first mentioned by me in 1825 under the name of Distrepta vaginata ; it was after- 
wards recorded, in 1828, by Kunze as Póppigia Chilensis; Colla then described it, in 
1836, in the Memoirs of the Turin Academy, under the name of Tecophilea violeflora, a 
name which it has since retained. Unacquainted with these circumstances, Póppig finally 
published the same plant, in 1838, as PAyganthus vernus. Kunze and Colla placed the 
genus in Narcissee among Amaryllidacee; Póppig arranged it in Homodoravcee ; End- 
licher gave it a place at the end of Zridacee after Crocus. Dr. Leybóld considered his 
new order, although agreeing with Jridaceæ in the structure of the perianth and root, 
to be very distinct from that family in the number, introrse direction, and dehiscence of 
the anthers. In my note above mentioned, I described the structure of the anthers more 
correctly than had been done previously, and showed that the peculiarity of the genus 
consisted in having three of the stamens, perfectly developed, placed on one side of the 
perianth, while three other sterile ones are on the opposite side. Each of the fertile 
oblong anthers is 2-celled, the cells being united together in a spur at the base, and it 
opens in the apex by an oblique transverse fissure, thus forming an operculiform cap, 
Which is thrown back, leaving two pore-like apertures for the discharge of the pollen. 
The three collateral staminodes are longer than the fertile stamens; they are lanceolate, 
of a dark blue colour, and terminated by a white lanceiform sterile anther, transversely 
2-valved, like a long open 2-celled pouch. The capsule is oblong, pointed at both extre- 
mities, trigonous, with three salient carinated angles, and marked at about one-third of 
its length from the summit by a transverse cicatrix showing the line of circumscission of 
the perianth; above this ring the capsule opens loculicidally along the carinated ridges 
by three valves, which are septiferous in their middle. 
Dr. Leybóld does not mention the circumstance ; but it may be presumed that the chief 
feature on which the Tecophileacee would rest is the semiinferior character of the ovary 
and capsule, which would place it between Liliacee and Tridacee. The sterility of three 
of its stamens is not peculiar to Tecophilea, for it occurs in the Liliaceous genera Albuca, 
Brodiea, Leucocoryne, and in some degree in Zephyra and Cyanella. The partial infe- 
riority of the ovary is also an aberrant and variable character seen in many genera, 
particularly in all the Conantheree ; and my present object is to show that Tecophilea 
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