Perea n 4 in fac ittle importance, if 
to what we conceive to be the interior limb.* These distinctions are perhaps, 10 Pees b : h 
1 . a " t here observe, that no 
all Botanists were agreed respecting them; but this not being the case, we mus ? 
disputable member as a calyx, particularly as 
substantial grounds appear to us to exist for considering this 
he fruit when the rest of the flower 
in this genus the real calyx is foliaceous and permanent, remaining on t 
q i i he inner li 
has perished; whilst the part in question is membranaceous, united in the same tube with the inner limb, 
and perishing with the rest of the flower. To which it must be added, that the same conformation extends 
also through the whole tribe of Scitaminean Plants; and consequently, 
calyx in Canna, we must apply the same rule to Hedychium, Alpinia, Zingiber, 
rolla with a double limb. The organs which this author 
if we are to consider this as an inner 
Curcuma, &e. all of which have a 
permanent calyx seated on the germen, and a co 
mentions as having been found between the calyx and the corolla, and between the corolla and the parts 
of fructification, and which seem to have given rise to the idea of barren stamina, we have never been able 
to discover, in any of the numerous species which we have examined of this genus. 
The first great distinction which arises on the species of Canna, as we have considered them, is founded 
on the upper lip of the interior limb of the corolla, which is in some species divided into two, and in others 
into three segments, which, after long experience, we have found peculiar to, and permanent in the different 
species. It is true there are instances, as in the C. pedunculata, in which some of the flowers vary with 
four sections, and others in which the upper lip is entirely wanting, as in C. denudata, but these exceptions 
form no substantial objection to the general rule. By this distinction, the genus of Canna is divided into 
two nearly equal portions, and the further investigation of them is proportionably abridged. 
After deciding on the number of the segments, our attention is directed to the peculiarities of their 
form, and particularly whether each segment be entire and acute at the apex, or whether it appears as if 
a small portion had been artificially cut out; in which case it is said to be emarginate, bidentate, bifid, or 
notched. This again divides the species into smaller portions. The lower lip affords also important distinctions, 
both as to its form and termination, which is in some species intire, and in others emarginate—distinctions 
which it is not perhaps unreasonable to suppose were intended for the purpose of variety and discrimination, 
it not being probable that such a minute variation in the extremities of the flower can be of any peculiar 
use in the economy of the plant. 
Some distinctions also arise from the exterior limb of the corolla, both as to its form and colour, and 
whether it be erect or reflexed. The peculiarities of the leaves, whether they be equally or unequally divided 
by the mid-rib, smooth or downy, green or glaucous, and the general habit and growth of the plant, afford 
further materials from which the student may be enabled to reduce these numerous species to an intelligible 
order, at the same time assigning a sufficient reason for the place which each of them occupies. 
All the species of Canna are, we believe, inodorous. Although not equal in the variety and splendour of 
their flowers to several other genera of Monandrian Plants, yet they are highly deserving of cultivation, as 
exhibiting a genus every species of which may boast its peculiar beauty, and displaying in their arrangement 
as useful a lesson to a young student as any other genus of plants can supply. 
These plants are chiefly natives of Brazil, and other tropical parts of America, In the Flora Indica of 
Dr. Roxburgh, only one species appears, which he has denominated C. indica, but which we have given under 
the name of C. orientalis, the true C. indica having been brought from America, and not found, as far as is yet 
known, in Asia. The number of species introduced into Europe has, of late years, rapidly increased. In the 
8: oe Mes seabeiinm piivailidenow: D) we find only four species; in that of Roemer and Schultes (1817,) twelve; 
and in the edition of Sprengel (1825,) thirteen; whilst in the present work we have been enabled to give nearly 
double ‘the latter number, most of which have been drawn and described from. the living plants in the Botani 
e Botanic 
Garden at Liverpool. 
* «In Cannis adesse calycem duplicem, docet, ut videtur, aspectus. Nam quum Cannarum flores struct rfecti 
i i i ‘ ura perfectiori gaudeant 
organa in medio sunt, inter calycem corollamque, et inter corrollam et genetalia. Soe foliola illa coneava striata, nectarii. tub 8 t, nonnulla 
» Nectarii tubo insei i i 
et petala loco et structura versantur, tamen forma et structura magis ad calycemn accedunt, under pene rta, inter: calyeem 
aycis interioris.’—Hegets. 5 
3 gets. p. 5. 
