384 Linnaan Society. 



much more closely to Insects in this respect, as well as in the more 

 extensive distribution of the organs themselves, than any other of 

 the Vertebrata ; and he referred to the fact that in apterous insects, 

 as in birds that are unaccustomed to flight, the respiratory organs 

 are less capacious or less extensively distributed. This fact, he 

 stated, is not confined to insects of which both sexes are apterous, 

 but that when one sex is winged and active in flight, and the other 

 apterous, he has always found the body of the former with vesicular 

 tracheae, while in the other, the apterous sex, the trachese are sim- 

 ply arborescent, as he has found in the sexes of the glow-worm, and 

 in the common winter-moth, Geometra trumaria. These facts, in- 

 ferential with regard to the use of the vesicles, the author supported 

 with an account of an experimental observation on the mode in which 

 the common dung-beetle prepares itself for flight, by rapidly in- 

 creasing its respiration and distending its body the instant before 

 it unfolds its wings and attempts to raise itself upon them. 



January 18, 1848.— N. Wallich, Esq., M.D., in the Chair. 



Read a paper " On the genus Atamisquea." Bv John Miers, Esq., 

 F.R.S., F.L.S. &c. 



Of this Capparideous genus, named by Mr. Miers in his ' Travels 

 in Chile,' vol. ii. p. 529, and subsequently characterized by Sir W. 

 J. Hooker in his ' Botanical Miscellany,' Mr. Miers gives the follow- 

 ing more complete character, derived from the living plant. 



Atamisquea, Miers. 

 Char. Gen. Sepala 2, ovoidea, concava, aestivatione marginibus subim- 

 bricatis, in torum carnosum, cyathiforrnem persistentem demum indu- 

 ratum dentibus erectis notatum coalita, decidua. Petala 6, e margine 

 tori orta, insequalia, lineari-spathulata, reflexa ; 2 superiora erectiora, 

 sestivatione subimbricata ; 2 lateralia breviora, exteriora. Stamina 9, 

 quorum 6 fertilia longiora ; filamenta aestivatione replicata, demum 

 recta, reclinata, glabra, basi glandulosa, lepidota ; anthem oblongse, 

 2-loculares, basifixse, erectae, demum curvatae. Tliecaphorum decli- 

 natum ; basi glabrum, disco staminifero cinctum, hinc geniculatum ; 

 iud^ gracile, elongatum, et cum ovario lepidotum. Ovarium ovatum ; 

 stylus brevissinius ; stigma obtuse 2-lobum. Bacca ovoidea, subcar- 

 nosa, dense lepidota. Semina 2 (vel abortu 1), exalbuminosa, cochleato- 

 reniformia, funiculo libero erecto bifurcato ex imo loculo orto laterali- 

 ter appensa ; testa coriacea, loculo altero incomplelo hilo opposite. 

 Embryo campylotropus ; cotyledones magnae, foliaceae, incumbentes, 

 invicem plicato-convolutse ; radicnla teres, infera, loculo inconipleto 

 velata, et ob embryonis curvaturam hilum superrie spectans. — Frutex 

 durus, ramosus, Americse nieridionalis extratropicse ; ramis abbrevia- 

 tis, junioribus lepidotis, rionmmquarn spijiescentibiis ; foliis e ramulis 

 jmiioribiis orta, parva, alterna, brevissime petiolata, canaliculafa, eesfi- 

 vaiione conduplicata, subtus lepidota, costd carinatd. Pedunculus axil- 

 laris, solitarius, \-fiorus. 

 Atamisquea emarginata, foliis lineari-obloiigis basi apiceque emarginatis 

 supra viridi-niteiitibus subtus hirsutis incanis squamisque lepidotis 

 tectis. 

 Hab. in campis patentibus, aridis, salinis, Travesia dictis, Provinciae Men- 

 do?ae Chilensis. 



