A beautiful stove perennial plant, flowering every month in 



It rivals in this respect the 



the elegance of its 

 It is easily cultivated 



the year in the utmost profusion. 



while it surpasses it in 



Gloxinia speciosa 



figure, and the delicacy of its colouring. 



in light peat and loam, with a little sand; and is increased by 



seeds, which are produced in great quantities from the singularly 



twisted pods. 



Our drawing was made in June 1827, in the Hothouse of the 

 Comte de Vandes, at Bayswater. 



From Didymocarpus this genus differs in having a 5-leaved, 

 not 54obed, calyx; a stigma consisting of two reniform, unequal 

 lips, not simple; and finally, a long, spirally twisted fruit, not a 

 straight, comparatively short one. 



After a careful inspection of the ovarium 



P 



of this plant, we are persuaded that the genera to which it is allied 

 have no sufficient peculiarities to distinguish them from Bigno- 



niaceas. 



M 



as distinctive of his Didymocarpeae, are a supposed 4-celled fruit, 

 a simple stigma, and numerous minute round seeds, with a radi- 

 cule longer than the cotyledons. But we have long since shewn 

 that the fruit is certainly not more than bilocular, the two sup- 

 posed additional cells being produced by the projection of the 

 lamellae of the placentae, as in Martynia and similar plants; this 

 was stated from an examination of ripe fruit only : but it now 

 appears from the ovarium of Streptocarpus, that, in that genus at 

 least, the fruit is in fact only unilocular, there being no cohesion 

 between the placentae during the period of flowering. In the struc- 

 ture of their capsule, therefore, Didymocarpeae do not differ from 

 Bignoniacese. in 



being unequal and reniform ; the character of a 

 ascribed to Didymocarpeae is therefore untenable, 

 from the proportion borne by the radicule to \he cotyledons, is 

 obviously iar;ufficient by itself to distinguish Didymocarpeae as an 

 order ; but it may be used advantageously as a sectional character. 



It should be observed, that the above remarks do not apply to 

 Cyrtandra, and the plants related to it, with baccate fruit, which 

 may perhaps be allowed to constitute a distinct order, of which we 

 must wait for another opportunity of speaking. 



J. L. 



Streptocarpus the stigma is 2-lipped, the lips 



simple stigma 

 That derived 



