356 
E ge, 
./ SYNOPSIS OF THE BUCHNERE#, 
A TRIBE OF SCROPHULARIA- 
CE. 
By George Bentham, Esq., F.L.S. 
THE materials from which the subjoined 
paper has been taken, are chiefly two ex- 
tensive collections of South African Scro- 
phulariacez, the one transmitted to me for 
examination, by Messrs. Ecklon and Zey- 
her, from their own Herbarium, the other 
being a complete set of Mr. Drége’s Scro- 
phulariacee presented to me by Mr. Ernest 
Meyer, of Koenigsberg. For the genus 
Buchnera I have also been furnished with 
several notes by Mr. Brown, who has kind- 
ly allowed me to examine that genus in his 
New Holland Herbarium, and has present- 
ed me with specimens of most of the spe- 
cies, and Mr. Allan Cunningham has en- 
trusted me with the whole of his collection 
of the same genus. I have also availed 
myself of the Herbaria of Linnzus, of the 
British Museum, of Sir W. J. Hooker, of 
Dr. Lindley, as well as of my own, and 
have thus verified most of the published 
species, with the exception of Humboldt's 
and some of Sello's South American ones. 
My chief difficulty has been in the de- 
termining Thunberg's species. It is indeed 
true, as remarked by Mr. E. Meyer, that 
his descriptions, when given in detail, are 
better than he is usually given credit for, 
but so large a number are so vaguely de- 
scribed, without attention to the important 
characters derived from the flower, that 
their identity with specimens before us 
must be matter of conjecture, until they 
can be compared with his Herbarium. In 
quoting this author, the work I have made 
use of is Schultes's edition of his Flora 
Capensis, published at Stuttgard, in 1823. 
Three Linnzan genera, Buchnera, Eri- 
nus, and Manulea, have been included in 
the tribe of Buchnerec, and appear to have 
been considered by many authors as so 
many common receptacles for all Scrophu- 
lariacee with slender tubes to the corolla 
and plane lobes to its limb; the scabrous 
species, which dry black, being referred to 
Buchnera, and the remainder to Erinus 
or Manulea, according to whether the lobes 
SYNOPSIS OF THE BUCHNERE.E, 
A TRIBE OF SCROPHULARIACEJE. 
of the corolla were supposed to be bifid or 
entire. 
The character originally given by Lin- 
neus to Buchnera (Hort. Cliff. 501), ap- 
pears to have been framed from the species 
which he afterwards (Spec. Pl. ed. 1.630.) 
removed to Erinus, under the name of E. 
Africanus, and, in his Genera Plantarum, 
he modified the character of Buchnera so | 
as to make it applicable to his B. Asiatica, | 
and it is from the set of plants designated 
by him under this name that the chief 
points of his subsequent descriptions are 
taken. In his Systema Nature, however, 
apparently by some error, he has exchanged 
the characters of Buchnera and Erinus, 
which error Willdenow has copied without 
perceiving that he thus gives to Buchnera | 
a character applicable to only a small por- | 
tion of the species he includes in it, and 
which these possess in common with the 
greater number of his Erini; and to Erinus 
one which is at complete variance with 
every one of the species. 
Eleven years, however, previous to the. ; 
publication of the 3rd vol. of Willdenow's 
Species, Jussieu had already (Gen. PI. p. 
100,)so modified the character of Buchnera 
as to make it comprehend, though some- 
what vaguely, those two series of plants, 
of which the B. Americana and B. Asia- 
tica may be considered as the types, n 
which he was followed by Lamarck, Per- 
soon, and other French Botanists ; but none 
of them followed it up by any examination 
of the heterogeneous species usually enu- 
merated under the generic name. Brown: 
first (Prod. Fl. Nov. Hol. 293) distinguish- 
ed these two series as sections of Buchnera, 
giving to the whole genus and to each sec- 
tion definite and comprehensive characters 
which could thenceforth leave no doubt as 
to their limits. 
With regard to Erinus, Linneus, - 
also Jussieu and their immediate followers — . ; 
took their character and descriptions fom 
the E. alpinus (which it now appears must 
be removed from the tribe) enumerating, ; 
however, as species, more Or less of the 
South African Buchnerea. Willdenow, 
as has been said, continued to join them, 
EA TE 
