To us the present plant appears a distinct species from 

 aspcra y of which however it has been always recorded as 



the variety (3. . Without laying any stress on the larger 

 and differently coloured flower, it may be distinguished by 

 a foliage by no means various to the extent it is in that, 

 where the central upper stem-leaves have commonly a broad 

 disk with a shallowly indented margin, and are trans- 

 formed in the same plant by intermediate changes into 

 deeply pinnatiiid ones with a very narrow disk, in which the 

 villous pubescence intermixed with the araneous one that 

 covers the upper surface, is far more abundant, longer, and 

 harsher than in the present plant; but the more palpable 

 mark is in the outermost scales or leaflets of the calyx, 

 which in aureola are reflex, obversely or cuneately oblong, 

 flat, with a broad shortly pointed termination, and a 

 slight araneous pubescence beneath ; but in a.spera, revo- 

 lute, subulate or acicular, with a remarkably close shaggy 

 pubescence. 



This plant, although it has been long and very generally^ 

 known in our gardens, probably ever since the time of 

 Miller, has never been represented by any figure that we 

 can trace, except the diminished engraving we have quoted 

 from Boorhaave's Index to the Leyden Garden. It becomes 

 shrubby as well as aspera, acquiring by age a hard-wooded 

 close- fibred stem of nearly an inch and half in diameter. 

 Notwithstanding this, to have either of the species in 

 perfection, they should be frequently renewed by cuttings, 

 which strike easily if planted in a border of light earth 

 during any of the summer months. These, when properly 

 rooted, may be potted in the autumn, in order to be shel- 

 tered for the winter in the greenhouse or garden-frame. In 

 summer they can scarcely be supplied with too much water, 

 if properly drained. Old plants are apt to become mouldy, 



ml should be frequently cleared of their decayed leaves. 

 Both species are very desirable acquisitions for the green- 

 house, since, besides the beauty of the bloom, easy culture 

 and propagation, they afford a succession of flowers nearly 

 the year round. 



Native of the Cape of Good Hope. 



The drawing was made at the nursery of Messrs. Colville, 

 in the King s Road, Chelsea. 



a A vertical section of the calyx and receptacle, b A floret of the ray, 

 with the gevmen and double pappus, c A floret of the disk, showing a 

 barren stigma covered with pollen, as protruded from within the tube of the 

 anther to above its floret, in order for dispersing the pollen among the fer* 



tile stigmas ; after which it reverts to its former position within the anther. 



