MAr. vacv. x, 3'u?. Tiliace?e, Ju?s. Sterculiace?e, Vest. Buttneri?eee, Brown.--These several families, of which the /irst is by far the most extensive, have been viewed by Mr. Brown, as so many allied orders of one natural cla?s, to which the general title of Malvace? might be applied. About thirty*six species of these orders collectively, ?r? preserved in the present Herbarium, referrible at least to eleven genera, of which nine are most abundant in form a characteristic feature of) the botany of India, ?md the equinoctial parts of South America. Fourteen species of Hibiscus and Sida were observed on the intratropical Coasts of Australia, beyond which also, ou the opposi? shores of the continent, each genus has been remarked. One species of Bombax with polyandrous flowers, and sub- spherical obtusely pentagonel capsules, was discovered upon the East Coast, in ,about latitude 14 �?h, and nearly the western extreme of the same parallel, it appeared much more abundant. Of $terculia which is scarcely to be found beyond the tropics iu other countries, a species exists in New South Wales in the latitude of 34 � which railel it is more frequent in the western interior, and in tha? direction it has been traced to the distance of three hundred. miles from the sea-coast. The genus is also foun? on the North and North-west Coasts, where the species' assume more particularly the habits of their congeners in India. Among the plants of this family iu the Herbarium is a spe- cies of Helicteris (as the genus stands at present) which observed on the North-west Coast bearing fruit, wanting the contortion that characterizes the genus. This plant, together with three other described species, having straight capsules, may hereafter be separated from that Linnean geuus? and constitute a new one of themselves. Grewia, Corchorns, Triumfetta, and Waltherin, have been
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