On the Sonerileae of Asia. 
BY 
O. STAPF, Dr. Ph. 
Assistant for India , Herbarium , Royal Gardens, Kew. 
With Map, Plate XVII. 
HEN working out the Melastomaceae of Borneo with 
the intention of giving an enumeration of them 
to include a considerable number of new species which the 
Kew Herbarium received recently from Dr. G. D. Havi- 
land of Sarawak, and to show their geographical and phylo- 
genetic relations to those of the remainder of Malaya and of 
Asia in a general way, I met with various difficulties, which 
arose partly from the artificial arrangement of the species of 
Sonerila in Cogniaux’s monograph of Melastomaceae, and 
partly from what appeared to me a sometimes very narrow 
and not always uniform view of the conception of the species. 
But with this reservation, nobody can more appreciate M. 
Cogniaux’s elaborate work than I do. Any comparative 
study, however, be it for phytogeographical purposes or for 
the object of eliciting the phylogenetic relations of a large 
number of more or less closely-allied species, must be very 
difficult, if not valueless in its results, if merely based on an 
arrangement which has chiefly the determination of species 
for its object. Such a one does not spare us the trouble of 
reworking the larger genera for all questions which concern 
the natural relationship of their species. Much could be done, 
I think, in this direction by keeping separate what is required 
for mere naming, and for comparative studies of the kind 
Annals of Botany, Vol. VI. No. XXIII, October 1892.] 
