193 
The Hon. Francis J. PAKeNHAM to Foreign Orgice. 
My Lorp, Buenos Ayres, February 3, 1890. 
N the receipt of your Lordship's despatch of this series, No. 
39, of the : 95th of November last, instructing me to procure specimens 
of the Caraguatá P on - Royal Gardens at Kew, I communicated 
its contents to Dr. t, Her Majesty’s Consul at Asuncion, from 
whom I have received is RA of which copy is enclosed. 
e box containing the specimens in question reached me a few da 
, and I have the honour to transmit it to your ordin. aie i 
Vesjeuht; as it arrive 
I have, &c. 
The Marquis of Salisbury, K.G. (Signed) F. PAKENHAM. 
[ ENCLOSURE. ] 
SIR, Asuncion, January 12, L 
I BEG to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of ds “Pith 
ultimo, es ind copy of a letter, dated 20th November, Royal 
Gardens 
By the steamer * Satur no," of the Platense Company, I have the 
pleasure to sen you this day a box containing samples of the 
Caraguatá plant, and of its fruit and inflorescence, which I hope will 
gone tinkoa: for the purpose of determining its scientific classifi- 
cation 
e, &c. 
(Signed) ^ NIE Stewart, M.D. 
The Hon. F. J. Pakenham. 
The material obtained through the Foreign Office, as shown above 
and that obtained upon a subsequent occasion from Dr, Stewart direct, 
were submitted to Mr, J. G. Baker, F.R.S., Keeper of the Herbarium 
at Kew, who has furnished the following account and description of. the 
Caraguatá plant as now known 
We have now received for the first time, heb n the Foreign Office 
full material for the botanical determination of this plant, procured 
for us by . Consul ee Asuncion. It proves 
o be a true Bromelia, nearly allied to B. inguin. In the 
onograph of li romeliaceze TN: A by Mez 
which forms part of the great “ Flora Brasiliensis ” dlicher and 
Martius, two species which are nearly allied hs it are descri or t 
first time, vy A. lanse, Mez, from Paraguay, and B. Regnellii, 
Mez, from Central Brazil. The latter, which comes nearest to it o 
the three species, is figured on Plate 53. The description of Rhodo 
stachys argentina in my Handbook of the Bromeliacee, p. 80 far as 
regards the inflorescence in a state of fruit, relates to the present plant ; 
but now that we have the flowers, they show that the plant is not a 
Rhodostachys, = a Bromelia, and that the leaves that were segini 
sent with it do no y belong to the same species as the flowers. 
are therefore ne much indebted to Dr. Stewart te enabling us 
clear the matter up, and I give now a full description of the plant die 
the name of Bromelia argentina, drawn up entirely from his latest 
specimens, received Feb. 10, 1892. 
A 2 
