with Descriptions of two New Species . 745 
Jussieu (1789), who had more definite ideas, included it in 
his ‘ Berberides.’ In this he was followed by St. Hilaire in 
1805, and Roemer and Schultes in 1819. 
In 1823, according to various horticultural authorities, it 
was in cultivation in this country, but I have not succeeded in 
finding any published exact record of its introduction. 
I have some doubts, however, about this date being correct, 
because I have found evidence of its having been introduced 
to Kew in 1824. In the Kew collection there are three 
coloured drawings of barren branches of C. laevigata. The 
earliest is dated Feb. 1825, and is endorsed as having been 
made from a living plant sent by Mr. Allan Cunningham from 
New South Wales in 3 824, and a reference is given to the 
page of the ‘ inwards book J of that date, where it is recorded 
that the plant was dispatched from New South Wales in 
February, and received at Kew in June, 3824. There is also 
a record of another living plant having been received from the 
same source in 1 830. 
In 1832 A. Richard (Voyage de lAstrolabe ; Essai d’une 
Flore de la Nouvelle Zelande, p. 365) gave a somewhat fuller 
description of the genus, f e manuscr. Forst./ but he adds 
nothing of importance. He places it under ‘ Genera incertae 
sedis vel quoad ordines dubia.’ 
G. Don, 1837 (Gen. Syst. iv, p. 23) appears to have examined 
specimens, and refers the genus to the Myrsinaceae. He 
also mentions that it had been in cultivation since 1823. 
A. Cunningham, in 3 840 (Florae Insularum Novae Zelandiae 
Precursor, in ‘ Annals of Natural History/ iv, p. 260), gives 
a Latin description of all the parts except the fruit, and cites 
Banks and Solander’s manuscript name. He is also the first, 
so far as I am aware, to explain the process by which the 
Maoris got rid of the poisonous properties of the seeds, and 
rendered them edible. 
A. de Candolle (Prodromus, viii, p. 145), in 1844, refers to 
the genus under the Theophrastaceae as ‘ forsan praesentis 
ordinis sed corolla polypetala dicitur et placentatio ignota.’ 
In T848 Sir William Hooker figured C. laevigata from 
3 E 2 
