Tab. 5547. 

 THIBAUDIA Jessica. 



The Honourable Mrs. John Batman's Thihaudia. 



Nat. Od. Vaccimace^. — Decandria Monogynia, 

 Gen. Char. (Vide supra, Tab. 4303.) 



Ihibaudia Jessicce ; glaberrima, foliis membranaceis ovatis ovato-lanceola- 

 tisque caudato-acurainatis basi rotundatis integerrimis subquintuplinerviis 

 reticulatim venosis, racerais brevibus solitariis foliis multo brevioribus, pe- 

 (Utuculis pedicellisque brevibus crassis, floribus aruplis, calycis dentibus latis 

 obtusis, corolla oblongo-cylindracea, pallide rubra, filamentis brevibus 

 crassis, antherarum rostro loculo breviore. 



For this superb plant we are indebted to James Bateman, 

 Esq., a most successful cultivator of the genus, who flowered it 

 in September of the present year, and at whose desire it bears 

 the name of a lady who was an ardent admirer of the genus ; of 

 its precise habitat we are uncertain, but believe it to be the moun- 

 tains of Caraccas, the plants having been procured from Mr. 

 Linden's celebrated establishment at Brussels. It was sent 

 under the name of T. macrophi/lla, H. B. K., a plant which differs 

 remarkably in the long pedicels of the flowers, and according to 

 specimens so named by Bentham (and collected in Humboldt's 

 locality by Hartweg) in the very coriaceous leaves. The most 

 decided characters by which the T. Jessica differs from its nearest 

 allies are the very slender ultimate branches, singularly mem- 

 branous texture of the very large leaves, large flowers, and short 

 pedicels. It resembles a good deal a species in the Hookerian 

 Herbarium collected by Professor Jameson on Pichincha, at an 

 altitude of 8000 feet, and may be the same, but the leaves and 

 flowers both appear to be very much larger. 



Descii. A glabrous shrub, with pendulous branches. Leaves 

 a span to ten inches long, shortly petioled, ovate or ovate-lanceo- 

 late, rounded at the base, narrowed into a long acuminate apex, 

 quite entire, membranous, with five more prominent nerves and 

 numerous reticulating lesser ones. Flowers ten to twelve, in short, 



DECEMBER 1 ST, 1865. 



