CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOTANY. 
3 
two species extend into the Cordillera of Peru ; three are found 
near the Straits of Magellan ; seven others on the eastern por- 
tion of the continent, bordering on the Rio de la Plata and the 
Rio Grande; and another extending beyond the line of the 
Southern Tropic, growing along the sea-shore of Rio de Janeiro, 
and as far to the northward as Bahia. 
Some points of their structure are yet considered to be ambi- 
guous, opposite views in regard to them having been held by 
Brown and Richard, which I will endeavour to reconcile and 
explain. The stamens, always equal in number to, and alternate 
with the segments of the corolla, have their anthers free at their 
summits, but confluent by their margins towards their base 
into a syngenesious ring : the summits of the flve filaments are 
quite free, but are combined below into a cylinder, which is 
adnate to the tube of the corolla above its middle, while the base 
of this tube is seated upon a prominence which crowns the sum- 
mit of the ovary, and bears the style. Upon the tube of the 
corolla, just below the apparent attachment of the free portion 
of the filamentous ring, are seen five coloured fleshy glands, 
alternating with the stamens. Mr. Brown remarks * that this 
and other peculiar characters distinguish the Calyceracea from 
the hermaphrodite flowers of the whole order of the Composite : 
viz. “ the accretion of the base of the style with the tube of the 
corolla,^’ " the aj)sence of the epigynous disk or nectarium,” and 
the perfectly unilocular space of the anther-lobes ; besides these, 
the corolla is continuous with, and not jointed to, the ovarium ; 
the anthers are deficient of any membranaceous expansion of 
theii’ summits, and the stigma is constantly undivided. Mr. 
Brown further remarks that, in Calyceracece, “ the absence of an 
epigynous disk is a necessary consequence of the accretion of 
the base of the style with the tube of the eorolla;” and it appeared 
to him that a modification of the same organ may be traced in 
the five thickened areolae observable within and near the base of 
the tube formed by the filaments in Acicarpha spathulata, and 
much more distinctly in Boopis balsamitcefolia, where they have 
the appearance of five adnate fleshy bodies alternating with the 
filaments f he adds that the condition above alluded to “ may 
be considered as formed of a series of modified stamina.^' 
M. Richard, in his admirable memoir before mentioned, com- 
bated with great ingenuity the opinion of Mr. Brown, and 
maintained J that this “ aeeretion of the base of the style with 
the tube of the corolla,” and “ the absence of an epigynous disk 
or nectarium,” are contradictory definitions. He endeavoured to 
* Linn. Trans, xii. p. 137. t Linn. Trans, xii. p. 140. 
.f Mem. Mus. vi. p. 6/. 
