BRUNONIA'CE1E, Brunoniads, the Brunouia Tribe, o natural order of plants belonging to the Monopetalous Exogens. This order was defined by Robert Brown, and has for its type a genus which was named after him. He placed it as o section of the natural order Goodenorirr, but it is raised to the rank of an independent order by Professor Lindley. It has an inferior calyx in 5 divisions, with four bracts at the base ; a monopetalous corolla, almost regular 5-parted inferior withering ; definite hypogynoua stamens, alternate with the segments of the corolla ; the anthers collateral, slightly cohering ; a 1-celled ovary, with a single erect ovule; a single stigma inclosed in a 2-valved cup ; a membranous fruit (a utricle) inclosed within the indurated tube of the calyx ; a solitary erect seed without albumen ; the embryo with plano-convex fleshy cotyledons, and a minute inferior radicle.
This order has L.rt one genus, of which there are two species. They are herbs, natives of' Australia, having flowers of an azure blue, which are on scapes, collected in heads, and surrounded by enlarged bracts. Although placed by Brown in Goodenorite, Lindley thinks it differs essentially from that order "in the superior 1-celled ovary and capitate flowers, thus approaching some species of Dipsacem, but differing in the want of an involucel, the erect ovule, superior ovary, and peculiar stigma." It agrees with Compositm in inflorescence, in the mativation
of the corolla, in the remarkable joint or change of texture in the apex of its filaments, and in the structure of the ovarium and seed. Brown remarks, that " in the opposite parietes of the ovarium of Brunonia two nerves or vascular cords are observable, which are continued into the style, where they become approximated and parallel. This struc ture, so nearly resembling that of Compositor, seems to strengthen the analogical argument in favour of the hypothesis advanced in the pre sent paper of the compound nature of the pistillum in that order, end of its type in pinenogarnous plants generally ; Brunonia having an obvious and near affinity to Goodenori(e, in the greater part of whose genera the ovarium has actually two cella, with one or an indefinite number of ovule, in each ; while in a few genera of the same order, as Dampiera, Diaspasis, and certain species of Sea-rola, it is equally reduced to one cell and a single ovuluin." There is but the genus, Brunonia, with two species, in this order. (IL Brown, Linn. Trans., xii. 132; Lindley, Vegetable Kingdom, 266.) BRYA'CEh, a name given to a section of the natural order of Mosses. [Muses.]