mb. 
13 
CEREUS leucanthus. 
White Torch-thistle. 
ICOSANDRIA MONOGYNIA. 
Nat. ord. CACTACELA. 
CEREUS. Botanical Register, vol. 4. fol. 304. 
C. leucanthus ; caule conico multangulari, costis obtusis, spinis 9-13 validis 
subulatis patentibus fusco-griseis unico centrali subzqualibus : lana 
brevissimá, squamis tubum floris vestientibus minimis basi radiatim pi- 
losis, sepalis petalisque acutissimis staminibus multó longioribus. 
C. leucanthus. Pfeiffer Cact. p. 74. 
Echinocactus leucanthus. Gillies. 
This fine plant was originally received by the Horticultural 
Society from the late Dr. Gillies, who found it in Chili; it 
flowered in the Society’s garden for the first time in 1831, 
when its blossoms had not gained their full size, and again in 
August 1836, at which time they had acquired the beautiful 
form and colour now represented. 
The specimen in question is now between nine and ten 
inches high, seven inches in diameter at the base, whence it 
tapers away till its diameter is not more than three or four 
inches. It has seventeen ribs at the base, and twenty-two at 
the top, which are obtuse, and a little wavy, but gradually 
disappear altogether near the ground, where the stem be- 
comes round. The spines are brownish when young, and 
spring from the midst of a quantity of brown wool, which 
becomes grey with age, and at last disappears; when full 
with from 9 to 13 in an outer row, and one in the centre, 
grown they are rather more than an inch long, dull grey, 
stiff, terete, a little curved right and left from the centre, 
which is straighter, but scarcely longer than the others. The 
flowers are six inches long, pure white inside, but dull olive 
green on the outside and on the top, with a tinge of pink at 
the points of the sepals and outer petals. The apex of the 
plant is so closely covered with wool as to look not a little 
like a Melocactus. 
March, 1840. F 
