PLAMT^ JAVANICiE RARIORES. 617 



referred to the Natural Order Mahacecs as then under- 

 stood : the generic characters, however, are stated to be 

 taken from Aublet and Cavanilles. The erroneous assertion 

 of the latter that the flowers are hermaphrodite, and his 

 accovmt of the gradual development of pistillum are adopted, 

 and finally Jussieu expresses a doubt whether the embryo 

 is corrugated, which he describes it to be in all the other 

 genera of the same section of Malvacece, and which he 

 considers as one of the principal characters of that Natural 

 Order. 



In Schreber's edition of the ' Genera Plantarum'^ of 

 Linnaeus, published the same year, Sterculia is referred to 

 Dodecandria, and the few changes made in the character are 

 apparently taken from Cavanilles, and among these is the 

 stigma hifidum. 



In 1789 also Dryander, in the first edition of 'Hortus 

 Kewensis,' established, partly from the manuscripts of 

 J. G. Koenig, the genus Heritiera^ which he justly 

 places next to Sterculia, and refers both to Monoecia 

 MonadelpMa. 



Neither in Willdenow's edition of the ' Species Planta- 

 rum' of Linnaeus, nor in Persoon's ' Synopsis' is any 

 important alteration made in the character of the genus, 

 which, following Schreber, is referred by Willdenow to 

 Dodecandria, and by Persoon to MonadelpMa. 



In 1804 Ventenat, in his 'Jardin de la Malmaison,'^ 

 gives a considerably altered, and in most respects improved 

 character of Sterculia, of which with -some other genera of 

 MalvacecB, and the first section of Jussieu's Tiliacece, he 

 proposes to form a new Natural Order, Stercidiacecs, his 

 principal distinguishing character of which has been 

 already mentioned. He refers the genus to MonadelpMa 

 Dodecandria of the Linnean system for no very sufficient 

 reason, namely the existence of the rudiments of the other 

 sex in both the male and female flowers. He is the first to 

 notice the albumen bipartibile and radicula embryonis umbi- 

 lico opposita or contraria, both of which he introduces into 



' p. 324. 3 Vol. iii. p. 546. ^ yoj, ij. fg], gj. 



