under the name of speciota. But De Candolle's name of 

 phyllanlhoides having - the right of priority, we of course 

 adopt it, and the more willingly, because Willdeinow lad 

 previously given the name of speciosa to a different species. 



M. DeCandolle remarks, that before it flowered this plant 

 could no way be distinguished from Cactus Phyllantlius, but 

 the flower is totally different, that of the latter having a tube 

 many times longer than the limb, and being of a greenish 

 white colour, expanding in the night, and diffusing a fragrant 

 odour ; whilst our plant expands in the day time and is 

 scentless. 



Authors generally describe both a calyx and corolla, but 

 we perceive no distinction, unless the calyx had fallen from 

 all the flowers before we saw them. To us it appears that 

 the scales on the tube of the flower gradually enlarge till they 

 become petals, the internal ones being the longest. The 

 filaments arc very many, the length of the flower, and, with 

 the oval anthers, white. Style equal to the filaments, and in 

 each of the three flowers of our specimen divided into seven 

 stigmas. Germen inferior, one celled ; ovula many, shining, 

 attached to the parietes by a cord that half surrounds the 

 ovulum and enters it at its most distant point. 



The fine specimen from which our drawing was taken, was 

 liberally communicated by Thomas Wildman, Esq. of 

 Lay ton, in Essex, in May last. 



