CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOTANY. 
69 
centibus, folio brevioribus, floribus minutis, alternatim sessili- 
bus, petalis virescenti-flavidis. — Madagascar ; v. s. in herb. 
Lindley (Forbes), in herb. Hook. (L/yalt). 
Among the several specimens I have seen of this plant, some 
have their leaves quite ovate, others nearly lanceolate, but as 
their shape varies in the same plant, they must aU be considered 
as one species. It is described as climbing upon other trees, in 
the Province of Be-Zemcharak : the leaves are thin and coria- 
ceous, shining, very reticulated, of a very light green colour 
above, from 2^ to 4 inches long, and from 1^ to lA inch broad, 
upon a thin incurved petiole, with a dark brown corrugated sur- 
face : from 4 to 8 slender spikes grow out of each of the upper 
axils, measuring 1 inch to lA inch in length ; the flowers are 
alternately arranged, are quite sessile upon the slender pubes- 
cent peduncle, and are 1 line long, with a minute pubescent 
bract at the base of each*. 
PoRAQUEIBA. 
No botanist has ventured to assign a position in the system to 
this veiy curious genus of Aublet until veiy lately, when M. 
Tulasne has given a description of it in the 11th vol. (3rd ser.) 
of the ‘Ann. Sc. Nat.,’ where he has very correctly referred it to 
Mr. Bentham’s tribe of the Fcacinece. The analysis given in 
plate 47 of Aublet’s work, though roughly di’awn, is in the main 
correct, and the details there shown will be more easily com- 
prehended from the particulars I am now able to offer. The 
singular partitions that stand in bold relief on the inner surface 
of the petals, are produced by their pressure, while in bud, upon 
the enclosed genitals ; the force of this compression is such, that 
a portion of their fleshy substance is forced between the in- 
terstices of the curiously formed stamens, stamping a counter 
mould of their shape in the raised lines and deep cells that con- 
stitute the peculiar character of the petals ; the upper and trans- 
verse portions of the very elevated cruciform partitions thus pro- 
duced are deep, while the lower pale is broad and hollow in its 
centre, forming in this manner two very deep cells in the upper, 
and three parallel cells in the lower moiety. This however, as 
might naturally be expected, proves to be a variable character, 
for in a new species described by M. Tulasne, the two upper 
cells and the intervening deep keel are deficient, owing, it would 
appear, to the circumstance of the anthers being only half the 
length of those of the other species, so that the lower moiety 
only of each petal presents two carities in which the stamens are 
* A drawing of this species with figures of its floral anab'sis, is given 
in plate 9. 
