petiole, quite entire, scarcely more than one inch long-, often 

 glabrous, but sometimes minutely and indistinctly pubes- 

 cent. At the base of the petiole, on each side, is a promi- 

 nent, fleshy, roundish gland, depressed in the centre. Ra- 

 cemes terminal, solitary, slender, more or less peduncled. 

 Bracteas very deciduous. Pedicels short, curved down- 

 wards, so that the flower is drooping. Three outer seg- 

 ments of the calyx small, greenish-purple, oblong, two 

 inner ones very large, petaloid, roundish, attenuated at the 

 base, deep bluish-purple, spreading. Corolla of three, or 

 rather, perhaps, of five, reddish-purple petals, united into 

 one hollow keel, within which are the stamens, combined 

 below into one body, the free part of the filaments slender, 

 incurved, hairy at their base. Anthers oblong, opening 

 by a pore at the extremity. Pistil : Germen oblong ; 

 style curved almost like the letter S, incrassated above, 

 with a tooth on each side. Stigma obtuse, yellow. 



This pretty plant, with its small but bright-coloured 

 flowers, blossomed in the stove of the Glasgow Botanic 

 Garden, in June, 1831 ; having been raised from seeds 

 brought from Lurin, near Lima, by our valued friend Mr. 

 Cruckshanks, during the preceding year. 



I had in the Botanical Miscellany referred the dried spe- 

 cimens from the same country, though not without hesita- 

 tion, to the M. nemorosa of Humboldt and Kunth : but 

 the living plant, seeming to accord better with the M. obtu- 

 sifolia of the same authors, I have, therefore, here adopted 

 that name. 



Fig. 1. View of the upperside of a Flower. 2. Underside of ditto. 3. 

 Side view of a Flower. 4. Corolla, laid open. 5. Stamen. 6. Pistil. 7- 

 Gland, from the base of the Petiole : — all more or less magnified. 



