126 FLOWERS AND GARDENS OF MADEIRA 



full beauty of the flower is thus seen unshrouded 

 by leaves. 



The list of flowering trees is a long one, but I 

 cannot help mentioning a few others which are 

 ornaments to the gardens when in bloom. The 

 dark red of the Schotia speciosa blossoms also adorn 

 a leafless tree. The tree, which was called after a 

 Dutchman, one Richard van der Schot, in its 

 native country subtropical Africa is commonly 

 known as the Kaffir bean- tree, no doubt because its 

 blossoms are more suggestive of bunches of red 

 seeds or beans than flowers. 



There are a few specimens of the gorgeous 

 Poinciana regia, which flowers in summer ; its 

 peculiar flat, spreading branches are easily recog- 

 nized. No one who has ever seen these magnificent 

 trees in all their gaudy splendour in tropical regions 

 can ever forget their beauty. They deserve their 

 name, the royal peacock flower, though they are 

 more commonly known as flamboyant-trees, from 

 the likeness of their leafless branches, clad with 

 brilliant orange-red nasturtium-like blossoms, to 

 flaming torches. In Madeira the tree does not 

 attain to its full beauty, as possibly the difference 

 between the climate of its native home Madagascar 

 and that of Madeira is too great. Here the less 



