CHAP. V. ORNAMENTAL TREES, SHRUBS, ETC. 533 



siders this more properly a Gloxinia than a Gesnera. (See 

 1 Botanical Eegister for 1845,' p. 3.) 



3. G. Leichtlina. A very handsome plant; with large heart- 

 shaped, dark-green leaves, rendered soft and woolly by the 

 crimson pubescence with which they are covered, with their 

 under-surface of a deep crimson ; in character much like those 

 of some of the Begonias : throws up footstalks two feet high, 

 bearing a spike of pretty pale-vermilion flowers, opening in long 

 succession. The bulbs, much like those of an Achimenes, were 

 sent me from England, and throve and blossomed well in my 

 verandah at Gowhatti. 



4. G. splendens. The tuber of the size of a large Potato. 



5. G. magnifica, purpurea. These two last also I received 

 from England : they throve in my verandah, but did not 

 blossom. 



Besides the foregoing, about twelve named varieties are now 

 cultivated, I am told, with success in the Betel-house. 



Achimenes/ 



A genus of herbaceous tuberous-rooted plants, producing 

 during the Eains a continued succession of large, most lovely 

 flowers, in form something like those of the Petunia, but with 

 a more flattened limb. The number of varieties is very great, 

 nearly all of which may be easily procured from seedsmen in 

 England. The plants are best kept under shelter from sun and 

 rain, though I have seen them thriving very vigorously exposed 

 to the full force of the latter, greatly of course to the detriment 

 of their tender flowers. Their roots do not go deep into the 

 earth, they therefore need only shallow pots or pans. If pots 

 are used, half fill them with large pieces of brick, then put a 

 layer of cocoa-nut fibre, and fill up with leaf-mould rendered 

 grey with silver-sand and lightened with shreds of cocoa-nut 

 fibre. If pans are used, lay at the bottom of them a layer of 

 cocoa-nut fibre, and fill up with soil the same as used with pots. 

 The pans should then be let down in empty flower-pots, the 

 rims of the former resting upon the rims of the latter, as repre- 

 sented by fig. 8, page 69. By this means the plants will be 

 raised up to view, and vermin will be prevented from creeping 

 in through the hole at the bottom of the pans. When the 



