6 



Australian Plants, 



have unfolded new disclosiires in the afl&nity or geography of 

 the vegetable kingdom^ or such as have required an altered 

 position in the system of botany^ or such again as exhibit me- 

 dicinal properties like VeUeya, Trachycaryon, Beyera, Erioste- 

 mon^ and other Diosmese ; and not to scatter the connected 

 observations I deemed it expedient to annex occasionally, also, 

 notes and descriptions of allied species indigenous to other 

 parts of Australia. 



RANUNCULACE^. 



Myosurus Australis. 



Scapi filiform or setaceous, upwards but slightly thickened; 

 petals and sepals very small ; fruitspike narrowly terete, 

 somewhat acute, about an inch long; carpels numerous, 

 closely imbricate, rhomboid or almost deltoid, acuminate, at 

 the thickened base slightly spreading ; styles very short. 



On moist places or in the open plains where rainwater 

 lodges for a considerable time, near the Emu Creek, Hopkins^ 

 River, Avoca, Avon, Eichardson and Murray, sometimes 

 abundant. It is not little surprising that this genus, of which 

 hitherto only two species, namely : M. minimus from Europe 

 and M. aristatus from the Cordilleras of Chili have been 

 noticed, should find its representative also in Australia. Our 

 species is closely allied to M. minimus; it differs chiefly in 

 the loose extracurved basis of the carpels. 



PITTOSPORE^. 



Marianthus bignoniaceus. 



Innovation silky ; branches climbing, shghtly pubescent, at 

 length smooth; leaves patent, petiolate, out of an almost 

 heart-shaped base ovate, oblong or lanceolate, apiculate, net- 

 veined, above puberulous soon smoothening, beneath slightly 

 hairy, at the margins undulate revolute, as well as on the nerve 

 densely hairy ; pedicels axillary single or two, rarely three 

 together, at the base bracteolate, of equal or twice the length 

 of the petiole, as well as the calyx pubescent ; flowers pendu- 

 lous ; sepals lanceolate, acuminate, four or five times shorter 

 than the cylindrical, somewhat bell-shaped puberulous orange- 

 yellow corolla ; anthers yellow ; germen villous silky ; capsules 

 narrow-elliptical, somewhat compressed, with a longitudinal 

 furrow, biloculate, villous, cells many-seeded. 



