138 



POLVANDRIA, 



doms of nature, though less obvious to common ob- 

 servers. If plants do not possess sensibility they often 

 possess irritability, and habits very analogous to those 

 of animal life. Linnaeus has enumerated forty six 

 different flowers that close and open at certain hours 

 of the day. Some plants fold their leaves, or the 

 petals of their flowers, as if to take rest, or prevent 

 being stimulated by external bodies, some in the day 

 only, and others only in the night j and this Lin- 

 naeus calls the sleep of plants, from the apparent re- 

 semblance to that state among animals. The White 

 Water Lily closes its flower in the evening, and when 

 the sun returns expands itself again. 



LOTUS, Nymphcea Lotus, As I have before ob- 

 served, Lotus is a name that the Ancients appear to 

 have given to several different kinds of plants. Pliny 

 distinctly mentions two ditlerent trees so called, 

 as well as herbaceous plants, of which I have no 

 doubt this Nymphaja is one. This is the plant de- 

 scribed by Sir William Jones, in his '' Botanical 

 observations on select Indian plants,"^ whose flowers 

 are either of a beautiful azure, or, rose-coloured, 

 and whose seeds, numerous and minute, are eaten 

 in India as well as the bulb of the root. The 

 new-blown flowers of the rose-coloured Lotus have 

 a most agreeable fragrance. There are also yellow 

 and white flowers, which have less odour. This is 

 » The annexed figure was copierl from the Horiui Malaba- 

 ricus of the celebrated Rhede, Tom. xi. PI. 2G. referred to by Sir 

 William Jones. 



