peculiar combination of characters that can be suggested 
is that B. dichroa may be a hybrid between two species 
belonging to different sections. Yet in the present instance 
this explanation is perhaps not the true one, because 
B. dichroa has matured seeds at Kew, and the resulting 
plants have proved to be exactly like the parent one. it 
is, however, just possible that too great stress has been laid 
on the character afforded by the circumstance that the 
Segments of the placenta bear ovules on one side only, or 
on both surfaces. B. dichroa is a species that requires 
tropical conditions. It has large leaves and is of a some- 
what lax habit; for a Begonia its growth is slow. The 
flowers, which are produced in spring, are remarkable for 
their shining orange-scarlet colour, a tint unlike that of 
any of the other cultivated species included in the group 
known in gardens as shrubby Begonias. 
Descriprion.— Herd, tall, with minute seattered beaded 
glandular hairs on the young shoots and inflorescence, 
otherwise glabrous. Leaves in young plants rhomboid- 
elliptic, semicordate, acuminate, 4-5 in. long, 2 in. wide or 
rather wider, blotched with white; in full-grown plants 
ovate-oblong, sharply acuminate, base semicordate but very 
oblique, 8-nerved with the lowest pair small and incon- 
spicuous, higher up with the nerves again pinnately 
3—5-nerved on each side, 9-12 in. long, 43-53 in. wide, 
margin slightly undulate ; deep green above, somewhat 
polished, pale beneath ; petiole $-2 in. long; stipules ovate, 
sharply acuminate, 1 in. long, 7 lin. wide. Pedunele 
oat in. long. Dichastum many-flowered, the male 
Owers terminal, the female axillary. Bracts cymbiform, 
ovate when outspread, obtuse, 5-7 lin. long, 4-5 lin. wide, 
pink like the rachis. g Flowers pedicelled, about 10 lin. 
pair oblanceolate, rounded, 4 in, long, 2-24 lin. wide. 
Stamens inserted On a convex raised receptacle; filaments 
short; anthers obovoid-oblong, very short, their cells con- 
vergent towards the base, ? Flowers sessile or shortly 
pedicelled. Perianth-segments 5, pink, the two outermost 
wide obovate, obtuse, 7 lin, long, about 5 lin. wide, the 
innermost oblong, rounded, 34-4 lin. long, barely 2 lin. 
