| Mr. Brown, on the Proteaceae of Jussieu. | 37 |
If Gærtner had not described the plumula of Protea argentea, I should not have hesitated to assert that it was inconspicuous in the whole order.
The number of cotyledons when more than two is a circumstance of little importance. In Persoonia, the only genus of the order in which a plurality of cotyledons has been observed, I am not even certain that their number is constant in those species in which this anomaly occurs.
In the following part of this essay it may be observed, that the genera into which I have subdivided the great African family Protea, are in most cases similar to those already proposed by Mr. Salisbury in the Paradisus Londinensis: from that essay however they are certainly not derived, but before its publication were formed and submitted to the judgment of Mr. Dryander, at whose suggestion they are now offered to the Society. That the results of an examination conducted by two observers wholly independent of each other, are so similar, will probably be considered as some proof of their correctness.
As Mr. Salisbury's generic names have the unquestionable right of priority of publication, I have in most cases adopted them, though I wish some of them had been differently constructed. But as I cannot accede to his application of the Linnæan names Protea and Leucadendron, I shall here, that I may not disturb the following arrangement, assign my reasons for differing from him in this respect; and as in so doing I am obliged to trace the progress of Linnæus's knowledge of the family, I persuade myself that this will in some degree compensate for the otherwise unwarrantable length of the discussion.
The name Protea, which originate with Linnæus, first occurs in the folio edition of his Systema Naturæ published in
| 1735; |
