Tap, 5940, 
AGAVE BessEeRrana. 
Tropical America. 
Nat. Ord, AMARYLLIDEZ,—Tribe, AGAVER. 
Genus Agave, Linn, ; (Endl. Gen, Plant., p. 181). 
Agave Besseriana ; subcaulescens, foliis 3—6-pollicaribus anguste elliptico- 
lanceolatis crassissimis rigidis rectis viridi-glaucescentibus, supra 
lente subtus valde convexis, spina terminali valida elongata margina- 
libusque remotis uncinatis brunneis, vagina semilunari lamina latiore, 
bracteis parvis sparsis triangulari-ovatis acutis scapo valido multoties 
angustioribus inferioribus e basi lanceolata subulatis, floribus paucis 
racemosis erectis 2-pollicaribus viridibus, perianthii tubo subcylindrico 
Jobis lingulatis erectis obtusis crassis longiore, antheris perianthii 
segmentis subequilongis exsertis erectis aurantiacis, stigmate obscure 
lobato, 
Acave Besseriana, Jacobi in Hamburg Garten-und-Blumen-Zeitung, 1865, 
p. 155. 
The Botanical Magazine has no higher function than that 
of figuring such plants as are rarely known to flower in this 
country, and are so difficult of preservation for scientific 
purposes, or for future identification, that but for good 
coloured plates they can scarcely ever be recognised. This 
remark applies especially to Agaves, of which fifteen species 
have now been illustrated in this work, a very small pro- 
portion of the number supposed to exist in European 
collections. Of these upwards of one hundred are enumerated 
by Major General Jacobi’s “Versuch zu einen systema- 
tischen Ordnung der Agaveen’’ (Ottos Hamburger Garten- 
und-Blumenzeitung, 1864), of which, however, comparatively — 
few have been described from flowering specimens, and many 
may consequently prove to be mere forms. 
A. Besseriana flowered in spring of the present year, in the 
unique collection of W. Wilson Saunders, Hsq., at Hillfield, 
DECEMBER Ist, 1871. 
