132 
CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOTANY. 
founded on the alternate (not opposite) position of the stamens 
with regard to the petals ; that they are all free and isomerous, 
without any tendency to become monadelphous or to be double 
the number of the petals ; its anthers are introrse (not extrorse), 
and the aestivation of the petals is strictly valvate (not convolutely 
imbricate ) ; to which may be added, the umbellated disposition 
of its axillary flowers. This eminent botanist considered that 
the anthers are sessile upon the margin of a monadelphous sta- 
minal tube, whereas I have noticed that they are perfectly free, 
being furnished with distinct fllaments, in no way connected to- 
gether, and seated round the ovary within a cupular disk, as in 
Calypso campestris, Camb.*, and in Hippocratacece. 
Before I proceed to indicate what I conceive to be the real 
position of Goupia, it will be necessary to detail minutely all 
that I have observed during a very careful examination of its 
floral and seminal structure. It has a small cup-shaped calyx 
covered with a dense short pile, and is deeply divided into five 
acute erect teeth, which have an imbricated aestivation. The 
corolla consists of five linearly oblong, glabrous, fleshy petals, 
more than six times the length of the calyx, their straight mar- 
gins being deeply introflexed and valvate in aestivation ; and their 
appendiciform apices, measuring half their length, are suddenly 
inflected and united together in the axis of the flower by their 
valvate margins ; they originate in the bottom of the calyx out- 
side and around the disk, being alternate with the calycine 
teeth; when the flower opens, they become horizontally ex- 
panded, with the inflected apices standing erect at right angles 
with them. The disk forms a notable feature in this structure, 
being nearly the size of the calyx, quite cup-shaped, with five 
very short teeth, which alternate with the stamens. The five 
stamens are erect, and stand within the disk, free from it as well 
as from the ovary - the filaments are short, subulate, and gla- 
brous, supporting a much broader and thicker linear connective, 
which, extending beyond the anthers, is truncated at its summit, 
where it is furnished in front with a horizontal tuft of long 
hairs, its margins, behind the anthers, being ciliated with similar 
hairs : the anthers are bilobed, cordate at base, double the 
breadth of the connective, to which they are attached by their 
whole length ; they are introrse, each lobe opening by a longi- 
tudinal and somewhat oblique fissure ; one-half of each anther 
rises above the margin of the disk, and their long apical hori- 
zontal tufts of hair meet in the middle of the ovary, passing 
between the styles, thus serving as collectors to convey their 
pollen to them. The ovary is spherical, five-grooved, and some- 
* St.-Hil. Flor. Bras. ii. 3, tab. 104. 
