CLASS VIII. 



EIGHT STAMINA. 



This Class has four Orders. 



NASTURTIUM is a native of Peru, and is said, n Drier x , 

 by Linnaeus, to have been first brought into Europe 

 in the year l6S4. It begins to blossom in July, and 

 continues till the approach of winter. 



The flowers, in the month of June and July, emit 

 sparks or flashes in the morning before sun rise, and 

 also during twilight in the evening, but not afterwards 

 in total darkness. This curious phenomenon was dis- 

 covered by a daughter of Linnaeus, who first shewed 

 it to her father, and to M. Wilcke, a celebrated elec- 

 trician, who believed the scintillations to be electric. 



Of this class and order is the numerous and beau- 

 tiful tribe of plants called Heaths, which, for the most 

 part, are natives of the Cape of Good Hope. Not 

 one is known to be indigenous to the vast continent of 

 America 5 nor, as far as we know, are any produced in 

 China or New Holland. 



UPRIGHT GALENIA. This plant was named order z. 



1 Two x isti 



by Linnaeus to commemorate the celebrated physician 

 Galen, who flourished in the second century. It is a 

 shrubby plant, a native of the Cape of Good Hope, 

 and flowers from June to August. 



There is no English plant cf this order. 



