172 Mr. J. Miers on several genera hitherto placed in Solanacese. 



of that of Heteranthia : its fruit is capsular as in the Salpiglos- 

 sidece, and its seeds contain a terete embryo^ curved in an ahnost 

 spiral form. Its leaves are always alternate and deeply pinnati- 

 sected, showing an approach to Salpiglossis and Pteroglossis. 

 The abortion of three of its stamens is an irregularity of which 

 we find a parallel case in lanthe, which only differs in that re- 

 spect from Verbascum ; and the deeply laciniated divisions of its 

 corolla is another abnormal feature^ but this may be considered 

 only as a separation of the lobes of the corolla at each sinus^ or 

 a return to its five normal divisions, with a still farther cleavage 

 of each lobe_, by an extension in an excessive degree of the inci- 

 sions commenced in the emarginatures of all the lobes of the 

 border in Salpiglossis, which thus shows a tendency towards the 

 laciniated form of the corolla of Schizanthus. 



5. SalpiglossidecB. — I have ventured to remove this tribe wholly 

 from the Sci'ophulariacecB for the reasons that will be here fully 

 explained, and as these are founded upon facts in great measure 

 new, I may confidently expect that such an arrangement will 

 meet with the concurrence of the author of the able monograph 

 of this last-mentioned family, who in detailing the characters of 

 the tribe in question, as given in the Prodr. DeCand. x. p. 190, 

 goes the length of saying, " subordo Solanaceis capsularibus arete 

 affinis, et forte melius eis adsociandus.^^ I propose however to 

 remove from it several of the genera there associated. They form 

 an extremely natural group, distinguished by the very peculiar 

 aestivation of their corolla, their didynamous stamens, or where a 

 fifth occurs it is invariably sterile, and they are especially conspi- 

 cuous for the remarkable dilatation of the stigma, which at once 

 signalizes them from the others. Their place is manifestly 

 among the Atropaceae, with which they agree in having the ori- 

 gin of the pedicels always somewhat lateral in regard to the floral 

 leaflet or bract, not decidedly axillary, as in the Scrophulariaceae. 

 They are all herbaceous plants, generally clothed with viscid 

 glandular pubescence, and the campanular portion of the tube of 

 the corolla is plicated in aestivation ; but the lobes of its border 

 are first conduplicate, with the margins always free from those 

 of the contiguous lobes, and twisted inwards in a peculiar man- 

 ner, for which I have proposed the term reciprocative*, a con- 

 dition intermediate between the induplicato-valvate aestivation 

 of the Solanacese and the imbricate prgefloration of the Scrophu- 

 lariacece ; in order to render this more evident, the accompanying 



* It may be thus defined: iEstivatio reciprocativa, i. e. lobi superioris 

 exterioris marginibus utrinque induplicatis, loborum alterorum simpliciter 

 conduplicatis, 2 sinistralibus dextrorsim, 2 dextralibus sinistrorsim torsive 

 convolutis, marginibus sese applieitis et a contiguis liberis postice spectan- 

 tibus, plicaturis antice inclinantibus. 



