ROYAL WATER-LILY. 49 



fabric of cast-iron just taken out of the furnace; its 

 colour, and the enormous ribs with which it is 

 strengthened, increasing the similarity. I could find 

 no prostrate trunk, as in the other Nymphaeaceie. 

 The root is central, the thickness of a man's leg, 

 penetrating deep into the mud (we could not dig to 

 the bottom of it with our tresados), and sending out 

 fascicles of whitish radicles, about twenty -five from 

 below the base of each petiole, the thickness of a 

 finger, and two feet or more in length. The radicles 

 are imperforate, and give out here and there a very 

 few slender fibres. From the same root, I have seen 

 flowers uniting the characters of Victoria Kegia and 

 Cruziana (of the latter I have only the brief descrip- 

 tion in Walpers), so that I can hardly doubt their 

 being the same species as had been already more 

 than suspected. The igarape, where we gathered 

 the Victoria, is called Tapiruari. I had two flowers 

 brought to me, a few days afterwards, from the ad- 

 jacent lake, which seems to have no name but that 

 of the sitios on its banks. Mr Jeffreys has also 

 brought me flowers from the Rio Arrapixuua, which 

 runs into the Tapajoz above Santarem, and unites 

 the Tapajoz and Amazon. I have further informa- 

 tion of its growing abundantly in a lake beyond the 

 Rio Mayaca, which flows into the Amazon some 

 miles below Santarem. Mr Wallace, who recently 

 visited Monte Alegre, had a leaf and flower brought 

 to him there; I have seen a portion of the leaf 



