110 Mi* Don on CobeacciE, a Neio Family Plafits^ 
walls and arbours with its twining leafy branches and profusion 
of large blossoms. This graceful plant is a native of the Great 
Valley of Tenochtitlan, near the city of Mexico, and was first 
introduced into Europe in the year 1787, and, from its ready 
propagation, both by cuttings and seeds, has now become almost 
as common in our gardens as the ivy. The genus Cobcea was 
first described by the Abbe Cavanilles, in the first volume of 
his excellent work, entitled leones Plantarum. Cavanilles has 
referred it to the Bignoniacea, and this arrangement has been 
followed by the greater part of botanists. A slight exami- 
nation, however, will shew clearly that this view of the affi- 
nity of Cobaea is extremely erroneous, and that its true place 
in the natural system has hitherto been entirely overlooked. 
The Genus, indeed, possesses almost no character in common 
with the Order in which it has had the misfortune to be 
placed by botanists. In order, however, to shew this more 
clearly, it will be necessary to state the great differences which 
exist between them. Cobcea is distinguished from ’ the Big- 
noniaceae by a regular pentandrous corolla, by its long, simple, 
undivided, incumbent anthers, by a triple stigma, by the struc- 
"ture and form of its fruit, and by its nearly erect seeds, fur» 
nished with a ffeshy albumen, and a simple covering. These 
characters bring it very near to the Polemoma^eae^ to which, of 
all established orders, it bears the strongest affinity, as M. Des- 
fontaines has already suggested * ; but it is abundantly distinct 
from these also, by the valves of the capsule being naked, and 
not septiform, by the oblique position of the seeds, and by the 
habit of the plant itself. I therefore propose to form a distinct 
Order, to which the name of Cobeacece may be given. Cobeea, 
the only known genus referable to it, has hitherto consisted of 
only a solitary species ; but the extensive Herbarium of Ayl- 
Jner Bourke Lambert, Esq^, has enabled me to enrich it with 
a second species, collected by Don Juan Tafalla, a pupil of 
Ruiz, in the province of Quito, in Peru ; and it is to be hoped 
that many new genera and species belonging to this Order^, still 
remain to be discovered in the extensive and little known re- 
gions of South America. 
* Ann. Mus. S. p. 30, 
