Tas. 6596. 
ALOE Perryt. 
Native of the Island of Socotra. 
Nat. Ord. Lin1ace#.—Tribe ALOINEZ. 
Genus Atoz, Linn.; (Baker in Journ. Linn. Soe. vol. xviii. p- 152,) 
ALok Perryi; caule brevi simplici, foliis 12-20 dense rosulatis lanceolatis acumi- 
natis subpedalibus e basi ad apicem sensim angustatis glauco-viridibus rubro- 
tinctis facie canaliculatis dentibus marginalibus deltoideo-cuspidatis parvis 
pallide brunneis, pedunculo deorsum applanato, racemis 1-3 oblongo-cylindricis, 
pedicellis flore 3-4-plo brevioribus, bracteis minutis lanceolato-deltoideis, 
perianthii rubro-lutei pollicaris segmentis oblongis tubo cylindrico triplo 
brevioribus, genitalibus demum breviter exsertis. 
A. Perryi, Baker in Journ. Linn. Soe. vol. xviii. p. 161. 
The subject of the present plate is a plant of unusual 
interest. It is said that Aloes was known to the Greeks 
as a product. of the island of Socotra as early as the fourth 
century before the Christian era; and yet till very recently 
no material has been obtained from which the botanical 
characters of the plant which yields the drug could be 
settled. In the absence of any precise information on the 
subject, botanists and pharmacists have supposed that the 
plant that furnished it was an Aloe which was figured in 
1697 by Commelinus from the Medical Garden at Amsterdam 
under the name of “ Aloe Succotrina Angustifolia Spinosa 
flore purpureo,” a species which was called Aloe vera by 
Philip Miller, and has been characterized by Lamarck and 
several later authors under the name of Aloe Succotrina. 
By the researches of Mr. Bolus this plant has now been 
ascertained to be really a native of the Cape of Good Hope, 
and the Socotra Aloe proves to be a species confined to 
that island, closely allied in general habit to the well-known 
Barbadoes Aloe (Aloe vera, Linn. = A. barbadensis, Miller 
= A. vulgaris, Lam.), but differing in its shorter leaves, and 
especially in its flowers, which have a tube much longer 
than the segments, and are arranged in looser racemes, on 
DECEMBER lst, 1881. 
