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XVII. Description of a new Genus of Plants belonging to the Natural Family 

 Bignoniacese. By David Don, Esq., Libr. L.S., Prof. Bot. King's Coll. Land. 



Read November 20th, 1838. 



XHE interesting subject of the present paper formed part of a small but 

 valuable collection obtained during a journey through the interior of South- 

 ern Africa to the western coast, by Captain Sir James Edward Alexander, who 

 has recently given to the world the result of his observations on those hitherto 

 little known regions, and who obligingly presented to me the specimen whence 

 the accompanying drawing and description were taken, and which happened 

 to be the only one of tlie plant he collected. It was discovered by that enter- 

 prising traveller, growing in dry arid soil, in the open desert, called tlie Great 

 Flat or Kei Kaap, in (ireat Namaqua Land, in 25 S. latitude, and 17 E. lon- 

 gitude. Tlie plant was but just then in flower, so that the fruit even in an 

 early state is still a desideratum. Sir James Alexander represents it as a 

 thorny bush, about six feet high, with several straight, nearly simple, twiggy 

 stems, bearing small hoary wrinkled leaves, and white flowers. Indeed the 

 whole aspect of the plant bespeaks the aridity of the region in which it 

 grows. 



There can be no doubt that the plant does really belong to the Bignoniaceœ, 

 although in habit it bears a stronger resemblance to ï^erbenaceœ, especially to 

 Duranta and Gmelina, and, in the absence of both flower and fruit, one would 

 never suspect that the specimen pertained to a Bignoniaceous plant. In its 

 spathaceous calyx, and in its regular funnel-shaped corolla, the genus comes 

 near to Spathodea, but is abundantly distinguished from it by the cells of the 

 anthers being parallel, and connate from the middle upwards. The ovarium 

 I have only seen in a very young state, and I am therefore unable to say any- 

 thing concerning the probable condition of tlie mature fruit or of the seeds. 

 On the specimen are two fully expanded flowers and a bud. The calyx in all 



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