THE HOT-HOUSES. 2l5 



biscus tiliaceus ; the spaendoncea tamarindifolia, 

 brought from Abyssinia by Bruce ; the date palm ; 

 an aletris fragrans, whose pyramidal flowers 

 shed a delicious odour in the night, and whose 

 stem, remarkable among the liliacce, is 12 feet in 

 height ; a beautiful pandanus ; a draccena mar* 

 ginata from Madagascar; and two arborescent 

 grasses (1) that cover the wall in the rear. Almost 

 all these trees pass the whole year in the hot- 

 house. Upon the shelves in front is a numerous 

 collection of stapelias, the singularity of whose 

 flowers and stems, would cause them to be more 

 generally cultivated, were it not for their dis- 

 agreeable odour. 



The last hot-house, situated immediately behind 

 the labyrinth, is composed of three parts ; the two 

 first of which, built in 1717 under the intendance 

 of Fagon, bear the name of the Cactus hot-house, 

 from their being divided by a large Peruvian 

 cactus, surmounted by a glazed frame : the third, 

 was finished in 1792 under the administration of 

 the last intendant of the garden, and is called 

 St. Pierre's hot-house: the entrance is opposite 

 to the cactus, whose covering forms a separate 

 compartment, heated to the temperature of 43°. 



(1) One of them has not bloomed, the other is the panicum latifoliumi 

 of whose hollow stock the American savages make the stem of their 

 calumet } or pipe of peace. 



