BOTANY. 293 



most emphatic manner, that she abhors perpetual self-fertilization. 

 This conclusion seems to be of high importance ; and may we not fur- 

 ther infer as probable, in accordance with the belief of the vast ma- 

 jority of the breeders of our domestic productions, that marriage be- 

 tween near relations is likewise in some way injurious, that some 

 unknown great good is derived from the union of individuals which 

 have been kept distinct for many generations ? " 



THE UGLIEST PLANT IN EXISTENCE. 



At a recent meeting of the Linnsean Society, London, Dr. J. D. 

 Hooker described a new plant, which he characterized as not only 

 structurally the most peculiar, but it is probably the ugliest plant that 

 has ever been seen. It was discovered by Dr. "Welwitsch beyond the 

 northern limits of Cape Town, Southern Africa, and has received the 

 name of Welwitschia mirabilis. It is a stunted-looking kind of tree, 

 whose summit never reaches more than two feet above the level of 

 the ground, whilst its short woody trunk never possesses more than 

 two leaves. These extraordinary leaves are, in point of fact, the 

 expanded seed-lobes, or cotyledons, which make their appearance as 

 soon as the young plant rises out of the ground ; and. what is still 

 more astonishing, these aforesaid leaves live, grow, and remain at- 

 tached to the stumpy trunk during the entire life of the tree, which, 

 it is calculated, lives at least one hundred years. We may also fur- 

 ther observe that these two persistent foliar organs spread out later- 

 ally, in some fine examples of the Welwitschia attaining, each of 

 them, a length of nearly six feet. The flowering axes shoot up from 

 the summit of the stumpy trunk, which is flattened at the top, and 

 like a folded card-table is divided by a central line into two equal 

 halves. The root is conical, and longer than that part of the trunk 

 which appears above ground. There are many other points of pecu- 

 liar scientific interest connected with the form and structure of this 

 astonishing plant. 



