and on the natural Order of Aquilaria. 229 
is ill-founded. The name Susam or Susani appears to be the 
general Turkish appellation of an Iris, derived no doubt from the 
Hebrew Susan or Schuschan, a lily. Dr. Sibthorp mentions Susen_ 
as the Turkish name of Iris germanica, one of the most common 
and conspicuous species. The ancient town of Susa itself is in- 
deed said to have owed its name to the quantity of lilies or 
flowers about it; but there is no authentic indication of the plant 
under our consideration, in particular, being one of them. On 
the contrary, its bearing our climate so well, never suffering, as 
far as I can observe, from any degree of cold experienced eats 
except accompanied by too much wet, leads us to presume it a 
native of a more northern latitude, and probably our English 
name, Chalcedonian Iris, is more near the truth. At least we 
may safely conclude that its Turkish denomination is no proof of 
its coming from Susa., With respect to the scent of this flower, 
I agree with Clusius, that no agreeable one is to be perceived 
‚about it.. On the contrary, I have found a slight, but very per- 
ceptible fetor, in the fresh-gathered flower, chiefly at the orifices 
between the lower petals and the stigma, which recalls some idea 
of the Stapelia genus, and affords another instance, in addition to 
those already observed, of a coincidence between the colours, or 
at least the style of colouring, of some flowers and their smell.—I 
might add a few remarks on the true stigma of the Iris, concern- 
ing which some unfounded ideas, as I conceive them, of my late 
friend Cavanilles, are given in Sims and Konig's Annals of 
Botany, v.i. 412. But those ideas are sbundautly refuted in 
_ the very same place, by the observations of Kölreuter and Spren- 
gel, who surely have sufficiently shown the actual stigma to be in 
the cleft at the end of that petal-like expansion, which Linnzus 
called by this name, and which constitutes the peculiar generic 
character of Iris. This a very slight examination of the various | 
2H specics 
