PLANTS INTRODUCED INTO THE VICTORIA GARDENS. 781 



raised from seeds purchased from Mr. Ernst Benary, Germany, in May 1901. 

 They have commenced flowering this year since the commencement of the 

 monsoons. 



49. Victoria regia, Lindl.,(N^^P^MACEM). * Queen Victoria's "Water Lily 

 or Koyal Water Lily. This well-known and magnificent water plant, remarkable 

 alike for its beautiful large flowers and its gigantic leaves, is a native of Guiana 

 in South America. The leaves are circular, large, said to grow up to about 

 12 feet in diameter. The largest leaf of the plants grown in the garden how- 

 ever, has noi; exceeded 7 feet, but could no doubt grow much larger in a tank 

 more suited to its requirements. The edges of the leaves are turned upwards 2 

 or 3 inches, which gives the leaves an appearance of a huge native " thala " or 

 tray with upturned edges. The colour of the leaf is green above and purple 

 beneath, and the petiole, lower side of the leaf and the calyx are covered 

 with large spines. The whole leaf is so well supported by the girder-like 

 projecting veins and ribs underneath that it is said to bear the weight of a 

 man easily. On experimenting I found that one of the floating leaves of the 

 plant in the Garden, which was about 7 feet in diameter, could bear a weight 

 of about 45 lbs., and to demonstrate it graphically I had a basket put on the 

 leaf with a six-year old child in it, and had a photograph of it taken in 1895 

 which is exhibited here. The flowers are large, when fully expanded quite a 

 foot in diameter, white at first, turning gradually to pink, diffusing a sweet 

 scent, and coming up in constant succession during the rains and occasionally 

 afterwards. Plants were raised from seeds purchased from the Superintend- 

 ent, Sajjan Newas Gardens, Udaipur, in March 1898, but with difficulty at 

 first, as the tender- seedlings were several times destroyed by fishes, which are 

 plentiful in the ponds in the Garden, and the plants were further damaged 

 by the great rush of water in the ponds during the monsoon. It is now 

 grown in a small pond made by emptying and excavating one of the old 

 manure pits in the Garden, but it is not large and deep enough for this 

 gigantic plant, and the leaves are often damaged by being shaken and over- 

 turned by strong wind during the rains. Though it is a perennial, it seems 

 to deteriorate here in the size of leaves and flowers year by year and has 

 to be grown afresh every year from seed. The seeds are eatable after being 

 roasted. 



50, PiTCAiRNiA LATiFOLiA, Soland (BROMELiACEiK).-j- An herbaceous peren- 

 nial, native of West Indies and Brazil. The leaves are long, linear about 

 3 feet by 1 inch, acuminate, white furfuraceous at back, margin irregularly 

 prickled, arranged in a rosette. The flowers are in a compound raceme, rising 

 on a long stalk about 7 feet high from the centre of the plant, the individual 

 flowers being about 3 inches long, bright red. Plants were purchased from 

 the Agri-Horticultural Society of India, Calcutta, in October 1897^ and 

 thrive well in Bombay in conservatories, or under partial shade outside. 



* The genus is named after Her Majesty Queen Victoria, and the generic name means royal 

 t The ganus is named after W. Pitcaitn, a physician of London, and the specific nanje means 

 broad-leaved. 



