upwards, whilst Befaria has a five- to seven-partite calyx, 
and a globose six- to seven-valved capsule bursting (as in 
Rhododendron) from the top downwards. 
B. glauca was discovered by Humboldt and Bonpland on 
the Silla de Caraccas, in the beginning of the century. 
It was introduced into cultivation by Jacob Makoy of 
Liege, who received seeds from the collector Nicholas 
Funk, and flowered plants of it in 1845. Its geographical 
range is uncertain; it seems identical with a plant collected 
in the colony of Tovar by Fendler (No. 743), and by Pierce 
in the Andes of Poruro (9000 ft.) in Peru, and it may hence 
prove a form of a species with rusty-pubescent peduncles 
and pedicels, which is common in the Andes from New 
Grenada southward. 
The specimen here figured was raised from seed sent to 
Kew by Mr. Robert Thomson (formerly of the Jamaica 
Botanical Garden) on his return from an excursion to 
the Silla with Professor Ernst of Caraccas in 1879, and 
flowered in the Temperate House in April of the present 
year. Mr. Thomson says of it, “I first found it at 5500 
feet elevation, forming thickets everywhere over the slopes 
and ridges up to 7200 feet, the foliage diminishing much 
in size at the higher elevations ; so much so that specimens 
from the highest spots might be taken for a distinct species. 
It grows in a stiff soil, partly of decayed vegetable mould, 
and partly of clay. At a height of over 7000 feet I 
observed a trunk two feet in diameter, which had been cut 
down at about ten feet above the ground, and the top of 
which bore branches two feet high. The plant, however, 
rarely exceeds eight to ten feet in height.” 
The other species of Befaria figured in this work are B. — 
coarctata (Tab. 4433), B. estans, Linn. (Tab. 4818), and 
B. Mathewsti, Hook. (Tab. 4981).—J. D. H. 
Fig. 1, Pedicel, calyx and style; 2 and 3, stamens; 4, ovary; 5, transverse 
section of the same :—all enlarged. 
