CONTRIBUTIONS TO BOTANY, 
309 
from nine to twelve sepals ; but if we add to these the six parts 
above mentioned, we must reckon, from his own details, a total 
of from fifteen to eighteen sepals — the number I originally 
stated. 
This circumstance brings the genus Sychnosepalum of Dr. 
Eichler much closer to Chondrodendron than he imagined, the 
principal distinction of the former consisting in the unusually 
great number of its sepals, as its name imports. He describes 
three species, to the first of which he attributes from eighteen 
to twenty-four, and to the second eighteen sepals, thus corre- 
sponding to the number in Chondrodendron ; his third species, to 
which he attributes a still greater number of sepals, will be seen 
to belong to a very different genus, to which I gave the name 
of Detandra^. The next character which Dr. Eichler considers 
peculiar to Sychnosepalum is the presence of six free carpels, 
fixed by their stipitate supports upon a raised gynsecium ; this 
is also a prominent feature in Chondrodendron, where the six 
ovaries become matured into as many stipitated drupes, which 
remain so firmly attached to the receptacle that they can 
seldom be separated without rupture of the parts. In these 
respects, and in the habit of the plants, as well as in the manner 
of their inflorescence, there is an absolute identity of characters 
between the two genera. The only feature that remains by 
which Sychnosepalum can be distinguished is the structure of 
the stamens, which is certainly very different from that in Chon- 
drodendron. Confiding in the accuracy of the analytical figures 
given by Dr. Eichler, I have acknowledged his genus, for the 
same reasons, partly, that I maintained Anelasma distinct from 
Abuta, and also Elissarrhena from Anomospermum : but in 
those instances this is not the only differential feature ; for others 
are found in the habit of the plants, in the venation of the 
leaves, and the character of the inflorescence. Dr. Eichler, how. 
ever, refused to acknowledge the validity of such differences, 
and fused the two former and the two latter genera into each 
other. If he persist in this view, he cannot avoid sinking 
Sychnosepalum into Chondrodendron, especially as it possesses 
fewer claims to maintain its distinctness than the others. 
It should be mentioned that in the new ‘ Genera Plantarum,^ 
at p. 34, the name Odontocarya should be placed instead of 
Chondrodendron-, and, again, at p. 38, Chondrodendron should 
be substituted for Botryopsis : in the latter paragraph there is a 
reference to the Cocculus cotoneaster, DC. (Syst. i. 525) (in De- 
lesserCs ‘leones,^ i. tab. 93), as an illustration of the genus 
Chondrodendron, which shows how little the Menispermacem have 
Suprd, p. 18; Ann. Nat. Hist. ser. 3. xiii. p. 124. 
