Part 73

SPECIFIC CHARACTER.

Mahernia foliis lanceolatis, glabris, apice dentatis; pedunculis bifloris; corollis luteis, odoratissimis.

Mahernia with lance-shaped leaves, smooth and toothed at the end; foot-stalks bearing two flowers; the blossoms yellow and very sweet.

REFERENCE TO THE PLATE.

1. The cup, (natural size). 2. The Chives, Honey-cups, and Pointals, as they stand in the flower. 3. The same, with the Chives thrown back, as far as the slight junction of the honey-cups will permit, without tearing. 4. A Chive with its honey-cup, (magnified). 5. The Seed-bud and Pointals, (magnified).

Many species of this Genus have, hitherto, been arranged as Hermannias, to which they are undoubtedly very nigh affined; in nothing essentially varying, but in the character of the chives, being, in this, placed on honey cups, which are wanting in the other; the same natural appearance however of the junction of the supporters of the tips, being common to both. From this small change of the identity of character, so necessary in our artificial system, they are thrown to a wide distance in classification; the one standing in the fifth, the other in the sixteenth class! The Mahernia odorata is from the Cape of Good Hope, and was sent in seeds to England about the year 1792. It is but a short-lived greenhouse plant, and must be raised every two years, at least, from cuttings; which should be made about the beginning of March, and placed on a gentle hot bed, they will by this means become good sized plants by midsummer. The flavour of the blossoms is exactly that of the Jonquil, it continues to flower through the whole year, but is as yet to be found in few collections, although from its different attractions we have no doubt of seeing it soon in most. Rich earth, of old cow dung, and loam, seems to be the soil it most affects. Our drawing was made at the nursery Hammersmith, in July 1799.

PLATE LXXXVI.

BIGNONIA PANDORANA.

Norfolk Island Trumpet Flower.

CLASS XIV. ORDER II.

DIDYNAMIA ANGIOSPERMIA. Two Chives longer. Seeds covered.

ESSENTIAL GENERIC CHARACTER.

CALYX quinquefidus, cyathiformis.

COROLLA fauce campanulata, quinquefida, subtus ventricosa. Siliqua bilocularis. Semina membranaceo-alata.

EMPALEMENT, five-cleft, cup-shaped.

BLOSSOM bell-shaped at the mouth, five-cleft, and bellied beneath. A pod of two cells. Seed winged with a skinny membrane.

See Pl. XLIII. Bignonia Leucoxylon. Vol. I.

SPECIFIC CHARACTER.

Bignonia foliis pinnatis; foliolis lanceolatis, dentatis; caule volubili; floribus racemosis, terminalibus.

Trumpet Flower with winged leaves; the small leaves are lance-shaped, and toothed; a climbing stem; the flowers grow in bunches, and terminate the branches.

REFERENCE TO THE PLATE.

1. The Empalement. 2. A Flower cut open, to expose the situation of the Chives. 3. The Pointal, and Seed-bud, (magnified). 4. A Seed.

This species of Trumpet Flower, is a native of Norfolk Island in the Pacific Ocean, lying in 29 deg. 2 min. south lat.; therefore, must be kept with us as a greenhouse plant; and, as a creeper, may be placed to twine round the pillars, or to cover trellis work; being of quick growth (if planted in peat earth,) and flowering abundantly from the month of March, ’till June. It is easily increased by cuttings, made in the spring, or by suckers, which it frequently produces from the root. The plant from which our drawing was made, flowered (and we believe for the first time in England) in 1798, in the collection of J. Vere, Esq. Kensington Gore.

Naturalists, when in detailing the history of the various articles passing under their review, should receive with caution, any matter which seems tending to the marvellous; but for the authenticity of the authority, from whence we are furnished with the account of the singularly pestiferous character of this plant, we can with confidence pledge ourselves. Colonel Paterson, now commanding at Port Jackson, New Holland, sent the seeds from Norfolk Island, when he was stationed there, to Messrs. Lee and Kennedy Hammersmith, who first raised it, in the year 1793. The N. I. Trumpet Flower is, in its native soil, a deciduous plant; upon the return of the season, in which the young tendrils begin to shoot, and the leaves begin to appear; within fifteen, or twenty days, the whole plant is entirely covered with a white downy insect, of the genus Aphis, something similar to our blight; which, in a very short time from their first appearance on this plant, become so completely dispersed over every vegetable production, that scarce a green leaf is to be seen through the whole extent of the island. So great a plague was this insect thought to be, from its effects on vegetation, by those who were sent to colonize the island, that it was considered as one of the principal reasons for abandoning the settlement.

PLATE LXXXVII.

IXIA ARISTATA. Var. atropurpurea.

Ragged-sheathed Ixia. Var. dark purple.

CLASS III. ORDER I.