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NOTES ON GUTTIFEKiE. 

 By Edmund G. Baker, F.L.S. 

 The following are a few notes made during a revision of the 

 collection of Guttifera in the British Museum Herbarium, in accord- 

 ance with M. Vesque's recently published Monograph. As pointed 

 out by Mr. C. B. Clarke in his review of the Monograph (Journ. 

 Bot. 1890, 116-120), Guttifem, as understood by M. Vesque, 

 excludes the aberrant tribe Quiinem, and also of course Aublet's 

 genus Touroulia* which Bentham and Hooker have referred to 

 Quiina. M. Vesque considers that this tribe ought to be kept up 

 as a small distinct family. It is to be regretted that the learned 

 author did not visit this country and go through the material 

 which we fortunately possess, and which would certainly have been 

 in many cases helpful to him. As forming by no means the least 

 interesting portion of tbe collections, I may mention that a few 

 years ago tbe Trustees of the British Museum purchased Triana's 

 Herbarium, in which are to be found the types of many of the 

 species described by Planchon aud Triana in their well-known 



Any one using the Monograph cannot fail to recognise the very 

 careful manner in which M. Vesque has drawn up his descriptions 

 from the material which he had at his command. The value, 

 however, of minute auatomical characters drawn from the internal 

 structure of the leaf seems to me very subordinate for practical 

 purposes to those more readily visible drawn from the structure, 

 character, or arrangement of the flowers, leaves, or stems. Characters 

 drawn from internal leaf- structure seem liable to more variability 

 than those drawn from flowers. 



M. Vesque's meaning is occasionally rather difficult to follow. 

 For instance, on p. 128, Tri/Juwlnni lineatum is described by 

 Bentham (Bot. Sulphur, p. 73), and on this Triana and Planchon 

 founded their Chtsia lineata ; but M. Vesque quotes < 'hisia i incut, t as 

 of Bentham, I.e., doubtfully referring to it Bentham's Triplandron 

 lineatum. clusia Seemanni PI. et Tr., which is synonymous with 

 Tripinulmn lineatum Seemann (Bot. Herald, p. 80), is a different 

 plant. M. Vesque almost entirely overlooks any work that has 

 been done in the Guttifera, in this country during the past ten 

 years. I may illustrate what I mean by taking the genus Sym- 

 phonia. In the Monograph six species are enumerated, five of 

 which are confined to Madagascar; but more than double this 

 number have been already described from this island. The fol- 

 lowing is a list of the Mascarene Symphonias, in which I have 

 ventured to incorporate two novelties : — 



