380 Dr Graham's Description uf' Nezo or Rare Plants. 



flowers expanded in succession, we dusted the pistilla with the pollen, 

 secreted in abundance by the male plant, and had the satisfaction to 

 see the germens gradually enlarge, and the seeds ripen in succession 

 in December and January. 



Descriptiok. — The habit and intlorescence of the female is so precisely 

 like that of the male described at length in the Edinburgh New Philosophi. 

 calJournal for October 1827, and in Botanical Magazine, fol. 2798, and 

 the figure of the female blossom taken from Mr Loddiges' plant, and 

 published in Bot. Mag. t. 2029, under the name of N. Phylamphora, is 

 so accurate, that I shall here add very little to the account of the adult 

 plant. Pitchers of firmer texture in their lower half, and the inner sur- 

 face of this portion, as well as the inner surface of the lid, is covered 

 with conspicuous glands. Raceme., or more properly panicle, crowded, 

 from the lowest pedicel to the ajjex about ten inches long. Capsule (1 

 inch long) erect and secund perhaps from the peduncle pushing out lio- 

 rizontally, ovato-oblong, truncated, crowned with four flat, sessile, brown, 

 hard, emarginate stigmata, tetra-locular, tetra-valvular, two opposite su- 

 tures, opening before the others, dissepiments from the centre of the 

 valves. Seeds dicotyledonous, very numerous, attached to the dissepi- 

 ments, erect, small, provided with a brown arillus, which is ^th of an 

 inch long, and greatly attenuated at both its extremities, angular or fur- 

 rowed, flexuose, and slightly twisted ; nucleus ovato-oblong, pointed at 

 both ends, about a fifth of the length of the arillus, and nearly occupy- 

 ing its centre, yellowish; embryo central, straiglit, white. 



Plate VI. contains a sketch of our male plant, made about two years ago, 

 when it was eight feet high. It is now IG^ feet above the surface of the 

 soil, and perfectly healthy, but scarcely more branched, one branch only 

 having come out under eacli of two panicles. 



Germination. Plate VI. also shews the ripe seeds, the germinating seeds, and 

 the young plants in different stages of advancement. Some of the seeds 

 were sown as soon as they were ripened, and others at various periods 

 during spring. They recjuired much heat to make them germinate, and 

 protection by a plate of glass laid over the pots, which stood in flats filled 

 with water. Germination began in April and May. Fig. 1. Arillus of 

 ripe seed laid open, to show the relative position and size of the nucleus 

 still covered by its inner coat, which is seen extending towards the 

 extremities of the arillus. 2. Nucleus removed from the arillus, and 

 divided, to show the embr3'0. 3. Seed with germination just beginning, 

 the plume rising in form of an arch, the apices of the cotyledons being 

 still held down within the albumen. 4. Slit in the u])per part of the 

 arillus spreading, the plume erect, albumen absorbed, the cotyledons 

 spreading, the first pitcher scarcely appearing in the centre. 5. Ger- 

 mination advanced another stage, the first pitcher with its lid closed 

 erect, and the radicle jjushing through the arillus on the opposite side 

 from the plume. C. Three pitchers evolved, having each two prominent 

 ciliated wings, and the upper surface of the lid muricated, the two first 

 sessile, — the cotyledons deflected, and beginning to fade, — the radicle 

 branched. T. Five pitchers formed, the three last upon the apices of 

 small leaves, but without any intervening cirrhus ; — the cotyledons more 

 deflected, and greatly wasted. The arillus remains in all these, in con- 

 ssequence of being transfixed by tlie radicle. All but Fig. 7- which is 

 of natural size, magnified. The accurate Gaertner (De Fruct. et Sem. 

 Plant. 2. 18.) never could have called these seeds monocotyledonous if 

 he had seen their germination. 



It appears from ihe abovf , that the pitcher is an appendage to the middle 

 rib of the leaf, this (the leaf) originally consisting of the ciliated wings 

 of the pitcher only, but is subsequently elongated downwards, and at 

 last the membranous expansion along the pitcher degenerates into two 

 prominent nerves, and for a considerable way along the middle rib is en- 

 tirely removed, leaving this to act as a long simple cirrhus. 



