[Plate 27,] 



THE CLOSE-HEADED BEJARIA. 



(bejaria coarctata.) 



A Half-hardy Evergreen Shrub, with Crimson Flowers, from the Andes of New Granada, 



belonging to the Order of Heathworts. 



Specific Character. 



THE CLOSE-HEADED BEJARIA. — Branches shaggy with spreading hairs. Leaves oval, acute, on short stalks, 

 closely imbricated, glaucous beneath; the stalk and midrib shaggy, otherwise smooth. Flowers deep crimson, 

 in very close corymbs; stalks short, covered with rusty wool; the calyx nearly smooth. Petals erect, nearly 

 parallel (not spreading). Style long, projecting. 



B. coarctata : Humboldt and Bonpland, Plantce cequinoctiales, vol. ii., p. 125, t. 121,. 



cx^oo 



THIS genus is little known in Europe. Mutis named it after his friend Professor 

 Bejar, of Cadiz : but Linnaeus, misreading j for f, published it under the erroneous 

 name of Befaria. It should be written as above, and sounded Beharia. It is nearly 

 related to the Rhododendron, from which it differs in its petals being all distinct, over- 

 lapping each other, and not united into a tube. The species inhabit the Alps of Peru 

 and Mexico, where their beauty becomes fully developed, and rivals that of the Azaleas 

 and Rhododendrons of the United States and India. 



The plant now figured seems to have found its way to Europe both through England 

 and Belgium. To our own country it was sent by Mr. Purdie for His Grace the late 

 Duke of Northumberland ; and it was at Syon House that it flowered, for the first time 

 in Europe, under the care of Mr. Ivison ; we also believe that Mr. Linden's collectors, 

 who found it near Pamplona, at the height of 8,500 feet, also furnished a supply of fresh 

 seeds. A third traveller from whom it has been derived was Messrs. VeitclVs collector 

 Lobb, who found it on the mountains of Peru. From one of his specimens a short account 

 of it was given in the Gardener's Chronicle for 1848, with a woodcut which we reproduce 

 for the sake of showing the very inferior appearance of the plant in a wild state, and the 



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