282 EELATION BETWEEN CLIMATE AND VEGETATION 



many new species of plants. The following is an account of 

 that excursion. 



On the journey to the place which I had formerly reached 1 

 met not only with nearly all the plants which were then col- 

 lected, but with many new ones. Among these may be men- 

 tioned a Vochysia forming a small tree, every branch of which 

 terminates in a long spike of bright yellow flowers, a new Fuch- 

 sia (^F. alpestris, Gardn.) similar in habit to F. integrifolia, 

 but a very different species, and which I was enabled to intro- 

 duce alive to England ; two new fruticose species of Gesnera, a 

 most magnificent Melastomaceous tree, which is perhaps a new 

 species of Davya. It forms a large tree, and the top of it when 

 cut down was literally one mass of large pink-coloured flowers. 

 It was with sorrow that I gave orders for such a noble denizen 

 of the forest to be destroyed, but specimens were not to be 

 obtained otherwise. I also met with abundance of the beautiful 

 JLuxeniburgia ciliosa, both in flower and fruit, an Helosis, an 

 Apteria, and a few Ferns, among which was the Asplenium 

 alatum, Humb. But perhaps one of the most remarkable of 

 my discoveries, on the ground which I had previously gone 

 over, was a very extraordinary species of Utricularia. Since 

 my return to England it has been published by me in Hooker's 

 Icones Plantarurn, under the name of U. Nelumbifolia, and 

 there a very excellent figure of it is given. Like most of its 

 congeners it is aquatic ; but what is most curious, it is only to 

 be met with growing in the water which collects in the bottom 

 of the leaves of a large Tilla?idsia that inhabits abundantly an 

 arid rocky part of the mountain at an elevation of about 5000 

 feet above the level of the sea. Its leaves are borne upon petioles 

 upwards of a foot long, are peltate, and upwards of three inches 

 in diameter. The flowering scape is about two feet long, and 

 bears at its extremity about half a dozen large purple flowers. 

 Besides the ordinary method of seed, it propagates itself by run- 

 ners, which it throws out from the base of the scape. These 

 runners are always found directing themselves towards the 

 nearest Tillandsia, where they insert their point into the water, 

 which gives origin to a new plant, which, in its turn, sends out 

 another shoot. In this manner I have seen not less than six 

 plants united to each other. 



The peak, which on my previous visit to these mountains I 

 had supposed to be the highest, was now ascended by a path 

 which had been made a short time before by Mr. Lobb, an Eng- 

 lish gardener, who had been sent out by a nurseryman to collect 

 living plants and seeds. Starting from the point I had pre- 

 viously gained, we made a descent into a wooded ravine full of 



