GLEANINGS AND ORIGINAL MEMORANDA. 
487. CHEIROSTEMON PLATANOIDES. Humboldt & Bonpland. A large greenhouse tree, with 
broad Plane-like leaves, and brown bell-shaped flowers. . Native of Guatemala. Belongs to the 
Order of Sterculiads. (Fig. 243.) 
In a recent number of the Flore des Serres are some observations on this plant by M. Adrien de Jussieu, from which 
we borrow our figure and what follows. The tree, known among us as “the Hand-plant,” has never flowered in our 
collections, although common in them. 
i as observed in 
Mexico from the time when 
palapan, of which Hernandez 
made such good use, and of 
which some traces still remain. 
— ]t is said to be wild in the 
forests of Guatemala.” [Since 
Humboldt wrote, the accuracy of his conjecture has been established. Hartweg 
found it on the mountains of Acatenango, and on the volcano called the Volean 
de Agua, forming trees from fifty to eighty feet high.] Hernandez made the plant 
known in his celebrated work (Rerum medicarum Nove Hispanic Thesaurus) by 
a short description and figure. He preserved the Mexican name Maepalxochi 
243 
or rather a paw with five claws. In the garden of Montpellier is a tree 
from seeds obtained from Madrid ; in 1813 it was twenty feet high, but had not à 
flowered ; but since that time it has blossomed abundantly. At Paris it has of late years been planted out in one of the 
great conservatories, is now about thirty feet high, and has occasionally flowered since June, 1850. To this M. de Jussieu 
adds a detailed botanical deseription, for which the reader is referred to the Flore des Serres itself, vol. vii., p. 8, &c. 
