NOTICES OF NEW NATIVE PLANTS. 31 



have been here cultivated, the most noteworthy are two low shrubby spe- 

 cies, viz. : — 



7. Pavonia Wightii, Gray, of Texas, raised from Wight's and Lind- 

 heimer's seeds, which produces a long succession of bright and light rose- 

 colored, widely expanded flowers, each lasting but a single day; and, 



7. Malvaviscus Drummondii, Torrey and Gray, also Texan, — with the 

 peculiar, upright, and convolute petals of the genus, of the deepest scarlet 

 color. 



8. UisGNADiA sPECiogA, of EndHcheu. A shrub, from 3 to 20 feet high 

 in Texas, where it is called Spanish Buckeye, bearing flowers somewhat 

 resembling those of the Horse Chestnut, but less showy, and in much 

 smaller clusters, and large spherical seeds like those of the Sweet Buckeye, 

 ■while the leaves are not unlike those of a Hickory. Not being hardy at the 

 North, this shrub here possesses only a botanical interest, as uniting the 

 Horse Chestnuts to the Soapberry family. 



9. 'SopHoaA sPECiosA, Benth. Among the considerable number of 

 Leguminous species of Texas, and of our southwestern frontiers, which we 

 have succeeded in raising, this is the onlv one of much floricultural interest, 

 and this, unfortunately, we can have only as a greenhouse plant. On the 

 coast of Texas it forms a tree, about thirty feet high, with a hard and 

 heavy wood of a yellow color, there called lignum vita, and used for dye- 

 ing, the pinnate leaves bright shining, thick, and evergreen; the flowers, 

 which have not yet been produced here, form a large cluster, like those of 

 the American Jf'istaria, about as large. According to Mr. Lindheimer, 

 they are blue, and sweet-scented, exhaling nearly the fragrance of violets. 



10. Nevinsa Alabamensis, Gray. This elegant flowering shrub, re- 

 cently discovered in Alabama by the Rev. R. D. Nevins, was described 

 only last summer, in the Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and 

 Sciences. Strong plants received last autumn from its native station, near 

 Tuscaloosa, may be expected to blossom next spring. The shrub grows 

 with long and recurved branches, like those of PJuladelphvs grandijlorus ; 

 its foliage resembles that of the Avell-known Kerria Japonica, but the blos- 

 soms are white. Judging from dried specimens and from the account of 

 the discoverer, the flowers are very copious and elegant. They are of a 

 novel character for the Spiraea tribe, to which the shrub belongs, their 

 beauty lying wholly in the tufts of slender white stamens, borne on an open 

 and foliaceous calyx, and without any petals. There is reason to hope that 

 this new shrub may endure the winter even of New England, in which case 

 it will be an important acquisition. 



11. OENOTHERA Jamesii, Torroy and Gray. Described from specimens 

 collected by Dr. Edwin James in Long's Expedition to the Rocky Moun- 

 tains, and brought into cultivation from Texan seeds collected by Lind- 

 heimer and Wight. This is a tall and stout biennial, four to six feet high, 

 with the aspect of the common Evening Primrose, (ffi. biennis,) except that 

 the flowers are much larger, the corolla being about five inches in diameter. 

 It has propagated itself by self-sowing, in this Botanic Garden, for several 

 years. But when left to itself, it does not flower before the middle of 



