[ 95 ] VIII. A Review of the Natural Order Myrsineee. By M. Alphonse De Candolle, Honorary Professor and one of the Directors of the Botanic Garden at Geneva. Read March 5th, and April 16th, 1833. During a visit to England, with the view of assisting Dr. Wallich in the distribution of the great Herbarium given, since that time, by the Honourable East India Company to the Linnean Society, this celebrated botanist did me the honour of entrusting to me the care of describing several new species col-lected by him, and among others, those belonging to the natural order of Myrsinecv. My first intention was, not to extend my researches beyond the Indian species ; but I was soon convinced that such an addition to a limited order like this could not be made without reviewing the whole of it, as I had Jilready done in a similar case in the natural order of Anonacece*. It led me, of course, to a better classification. I must confess, however, that doubts still remain as to the precise limits of some genera, on account of the difficulty of ascertaining from dry specimens the number and insertion of the ovula. This natural order was named by Ventenat Ophiospermes, and by some botanists Ardisiacew ; but Mr. Brown, who in a few words in his Prodromus Florec Novcv Hollandiiv threw considerable light on the subject, proposed for it the name of Myrsinew, which has been since generally adopted. Their place in the very intricate net of affinities is now well established between Sapoteee and Primulacece, notwithstanding their remarkable analogy with another remote order, that of Rliamnetv. Were the relative affinities of plants to be represented upon a sphere, as the position of islands, these different orders would be all under the same degree of latitude, but Rhamnece under a very distant longitude. MyrsinecB differ from Sapotece by the constant deficiency of stamens alter-* " M^moire sur la Famille des Anonac^es. et en particulier sur cellesdu Pays des Birmans," in the M^moires de la Socii'tt! de Physique et d'Hisloire Naturelle de Geneve, vol. v.
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