BOTANICAL INFORMATION. 93 
east. On the 14th of September, at 5 a.m., this flower rolled itself to 
the east, and between that hour and twelve at mid-day it was north 
again. * We conjecture that, as the flower-stalk certainly becomes . 
spiral, it is that which twists, and, in its contortions, turns and moves 
the flower from place to place. Its motions backwards and forwards may 
be akin to those occasioned upon a violin-string by alternate dryness 
and moisture; but what is the cause under water we cannot conjecture.” 
Mr. Chitty is, we believe, distinguished in Jamaica by the care and at- 
tention he bestows upon his garden. Alongside the Victoria he cul- 
tivates Nelumbium Jamaicense, N. speciosum, and vars. red and white, 
Nymphaa ampla, Hydrolea, Villarsia Indica, Alisma, Pontederia; and 
over the tank a Sterculia Carthaginensis casts its broad arms and screens 
the aquatics from the too powerful rays of the sun. We should 
strongly recommend that seeds of Victoria be thrown into the shallower 
parts of the ponds or lakes which yield the Nelumbium Jamaicense: it 
could not fail to flourish there. 
Nelumbium Jamaicense, P. Browne. 
Many persons have expressed their surprise that, common as the 
Victoria regia is in the Igaripes, or still waters which communicate 
with the rivers in eastern tropical America, it should only of late years 
have been discovered in localities which had been long much frequented 
by travellers and even by botanists. We have had occasion to make a 
similar remark respecting the Nelumbium Jamaicense of Patrick Browne, 
detected and described by that author nearly a century ago as a native 
of Jamaica: yet it does not appear to have been recognized there again 
since, till within these six years, as related in the ‘Companion to the 
Botanical Magazine’ for 1848. The same species however, as it has 
since proved, was found plentifully in the southern United States, first 
by Dr. Bartram. We had then supposed that Jamaica was the southern 
limit of this species; but we have now the pleasure of stating that our 
excellent correspondent, T. Bland, Esq., in a visit he lately (1852) paid 
to the mainland of South America, discovered the Nelumbium Jamai- 
cense in full flower and in great abundance in the “ Ceirajas between 
Santa Martha and Barranquilla, New Grenada.” 
