(seq. 2)

320 GENUS GLYCINE [August

# Observations on the genus GLYCNE, and some of its
kindred genera. By Stephen Elliott, of Charles-
ton, S. C. Read June 23, 1818.

In endeavouring to examine, and reform, the charac-
ters of plants, an inhabitant of this country feels sen-
sibly the disadvantages under which he labours.
There are here no Botanic Gardens, where living
plants, collected from different countries and climates,
may be collated and compared ; no large herbariums,
where even specimens may be examined; and no large
libraries, devoted to natural history, where figures
might sometimes serve to explain and illustrate an ob-
scure or doubtful plant. I shall not, therefore, at-
tempt to arraige all the species which have hitherto
been thrown together in the genus Glycine, but shall
confine myself, in this paper, to those native plants of
North America which I have had an opportunity of in-
specting.

The genus Glycine appears to have served for some
time, in the class Diadelphia, the same purposes
which the genus Sophora answered in the class Decan-
dria; to have been an ill defined genus, where every
plant, (some scarcely kindred species) which did not,
by marked characters, belong to other known ge-
nera, found a resting place. In this manner the spe-
ties have increased from two to forty-four, and now
present an assemblage of ill associated plants. Many
Hate writers have noticed some of the anomalies of this
genus, but no one, I believe, has yet attempted a radi-