636 Mr. MiERS on some new Brazilian Plants 



to the genus Burmannia. The plants I am about to describe will be found 

 to possess entii'ely the habit of Burmannia in their thickened rhizoma with 

 branching fibres, an erect stem almost naked, or at most furnished with a few 

 bracteiform leaves, and terminal flowers with a tubular petaloid perianthium, 

 having a six-parted border composed of three sepals and three petals ; sta- 

 mens three, almost sessile in the mouth of the tube of the perianthium below 

 the petals; anther-cells disjoined, opening transversely; style simple; three 

 stigmata ; capsule surmounted by the withered perianth bursting irregularly ; 

 and seeds minute, resembling those of Orchidece. Burmannia, however, pos- 

 sesses a trilocular capsule, with numerous seeds attached to a central 

 placenta formed by the united margins of the dissepiments, while in all my 

 plants the capsule is always one-celled, the seeds being attached to three 

 thickened parietal placentae, — a difference of no small amount. They vary 

 moreover from Burmannia in the mode of dehiscence of the capsule, and in 

 other respects, as will shortly appear. 



Before entering on the description of the plants which form the subject of 

 this paper, I will notice those before-mentioned recorded by Mr. Nuttall and 

 Dr. Blume. That of the former is described in the " Journal of the Academy 

 of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia," vii. p. 64, under the name of Aptei^ia 

 setacea. Having seen it only in a dried state, Mr. Nuttall was not able 

 to ascertain the particular structure of the stamens, but he describes it as 

 having a similar petaloid perianthium, without the winged appendages of 

 Burmannia, an inferior ovary, a simple style, a three-lobed stigma, an erect 

 stem with a few scattered bracteiform leaves : the difference from Burmannia, 

 however, is striking in the structure of the capsule ; for instead of its being tri- 

 locular with central placentation, it is unilocular with parietal placentation. 



Dr. Blume's plants are described in his Enumeratio Plantarum Javos. 

 Gymnosiphon, from its unilocular capsule and parietal placentation, will 

 arrange with the plants which I am about to describe. In regard to Gony- 

 anthes, I confess that I could not clearly comprehend that author's definition 

 of it until I had examined some species of the genus. The following is his 

 charaeter, slightly modified from my own observations : — 



