MIRABILIS MOMORDICA. 199 



flowers, requiring the same soil and treatment as with the 

 other species and varieties. 



There are many other species or varieties of this curious 

 plant, all pretty. 



MIRABILIS. 



Marvel of Peru. 



Mirabilis is a Latin word, signifying something wonderful or 

 admirable, and applied with some reason. 



M. jalapa, or common Four-o'clock of the gardens, is a very 

 ornamental plant for borders. When cultivated it sports into 

 many agreeable varieties. 



It is considered and treated as a tender annual. It may, 

 however, be planted the last of April, and bears a profusion of 

 flowers in August and September. Although treated as an 

 annual, it is, in its native country, a perennial, with the rest 

 of the species. Its large tuberous roots, if taken up and pre- 

 served during winter, like the Dahlia, will flower perennially. 

 The flowers are red in its native country, the West Indies ; but 

 in the garden are to be found white, yellow, various shades of 

 red, and variegated flowers. The powder of these roots, washed, 

 scraped, and dried, is one of the substances which form the 

 jalap of druggists. Stem two to three feet high. 



M. longiflora, like the last, is handsome and fragrant. The 

 flowers are pure white, with purple bottom, standing on long 

 tubes ; in July and August. 



MOMORDICA. 



M. balsamina, or Balsam Apple, is cultivated as an object of 

 curiosity, and for* its fruit, which is considered excellent, by 

 / tose who are in the habit of using it, for curing wounds. 



It has fleshy, ovate fruit, remotely tubercled in longitudinal 



