5 
"It was on the 1st of Januaiy, 1837, while contending with 
the difficulties that nature interposed in different forms, to stem 
our progress up the River Berbice (lat. 4° 30'N., long. 5.2° W.), 
that we arrived at a part where the river expanded and formed 
a eiurentless basin. Some object on the southern extremity of 
this basin attracted my attention, and I was unable to form an 
idea what it eould be; but, animating the ereAV to increase the 
rate of their paddling, we soon came opposite the object which 
had raised my curiosity, and, behold, a vegetable wonder ! AU 
calamities were forgotten; I was a botanist, and felt myself 
rewarded ! There were gigantic leaves, five to six feet across, 
flat, with a broad rim, lighter green above and vivid crimson 
below, floating upon the water; while, iu eharacter with the 
wonderfid foliage, I saw luxuriant flowers, each consisting of 
numerous petals, passing, in alternate tints, from pure white to 
rose and pink. The smooth water was covered with the blossoms, 
and as I rowed from one to the other, I always found something 
new to admire. The flower-stalk is an inch thick near the calyx 
and studded with elastic prickles, about three quarters of an 
inch long. AMien expanded, the four-leaved calyx measures a 
foot in diameter, but is concealed by the expansion of the himdred- 
petaled corolla. This beautiful flower, when it first unfolds, is 
white with a pink centre; the colour spreads as the bloom 
increases in age; and, at a day old, the whole is rose-coloured. 
As if to add to the charm of this noble Water-Lily, it diffuses a 
sweet scent. As in the case of others in the same tribe, the 
petals and stamens pass gradually into each other, and many 
petaloid leaves may be observed beaiing vestiges of an anther. 
The seeds are numerous and imbedded in a spongy substance. 
" Ascending the river, we found this plant frequently, and 
the higher we advanced, the more gigantic did the specimens 
become; one leaf we measured was six feet five inches in diameter, 
the rim five inches and a half high, and the flowers a foot and a 
quarter across. A beetle {Trichius sp. ?) infests the flowers to 
their great injury, often completely destroying the inner part of 
the disc; we counted sometimes from twenty to thirty of these 
insects in one flow er.” 
This highly interesting Narrative w^as made the groundwork of 
a more full history of the plant, accompanied by a splendid figure, 
in a separate memoir of Atlas-folio size, by Dr. Lindley. Only 
twenty-five copies were printed for private distribution, in 1837, 
to US, was published, with further remarks, in the ‘Annals of Natural History 
for 1838,’ p. 65. 
