Page:A Voyage to Terra Australis Volume 2.djvu/566

552 valvular, and which though generally irregular is never papilionaceous. To these characters may be added the straight Embryo, in which they agree with Mimoseæ, but differ from all the Papilionaceæ except Arachia and Cercis.

The Lomentaceæ of New Holland are not numerous, and consist chiefly of the genus Cassia, the greater part of whose species grow within the tropic. On the east coast they probably do not extend beyond 85° lat.; and on the south coast only one species has been observed, it was found in 82° S. lat. and is remarkable in being aphyllous, with dilated footstalks exactly like the Acaciæ already noticed.

The third order,, which comprehends about three-fourths of the whole class at present known, includes also nearly the same proportion of the Australian Leguminosæ.

Papilionaceæ admit of subdivision into several natural sections, but in Terra Australis they may be divided almost equally, and without violence to natural affinities, into those with connected and these with distinct stamina.

The decandrous part of the whole order bears a very small proportion to the diadelphous, which in Persoon's synopsis is to the former as nearly 30 to 1, while in Terra Australis, as I have already stated, the two tribes are nearly equal.

This remarkably increased proportion of Decandrous Papilionaceous plants, forms another peculiarity in the vegetation of New Holland, where their maximum exists in the principal parallel. They are not so generally spread over the whole of Terra Australis, as the leafless Acaciæ, for although they extend to the southern extremity of Van Diemen's Island, they are even there less abundant, and very few species have been observed within the tropic. Papilionaceous plants with distinct stamina do not in fact form a very natural subdivision of the whole order, though those of New Holland, with perhaps one or two exceptions, may be considered as such: this Australian portion, however, forms nearly three-fourths of the whole section, at present known: the remaining part, consisting of genera, most of which are very different, both from each other and from those of Terra Australis, are found at the Cape of Good Hope, in æquinoctial and north Africa, in the different regions of America, in New Zealand, in India, very sparingly in