this my idea be correct, the B. humilis of Botanical Register 
t. 284. cannot be the same ; for it is there figured with large 
and dense panicles of numerous flowers, the staminiferous blos- 
soms having four, almost equal, white petals, the stem wanting 
the beautiful transparency so striking in our plant, the stipules 
very large, tipped with a mucro, and the leaves, besides their 
larger size, and deeper green colour, being represented as wholly 
destitute of any kind of hairiness. I am aware that the de- 
scription in the Bot. Reg. speaks of the hispidity and ciliation of 
the foliage ; but that is professedly copied from Dryander's 
B. humilis. Gawler's plant is the B. suaveolens of Lod- 
DiGES and Haworth, according to the latter author. 
I confess that I can find no difference in the B. lucida of 
Haworth, in the work quoted above ; and the author says of 
it, " AfHnis maxime B. humili." 
B. humilis of Bon pl and is considered by Gawler as a 
distinct species, and is probably really so, being neither his nor 
our plant, since it is described as having the stem roughly furred. 
BoNPEAND, in his beautiful work on the Plants of the 
Garden at La Malmaison, has no doubt, with great propriety > 
formed of this single genus the Order Begoniacece. The ques- 
tion is, what are its natural affinities? Linn^us ranked it 
with the Polygona and Rumices, and Smith and De Can- 
DOLLE seem to be satisfied of the propriety of this arrange- 
ment. Brown observes, that its place is not satisfactorily de- 
termined ; while Mr Lindle y, in a recent number of the Bot. 
Register, thinks that he has detected a remarkable affinity be- 
tween the genera Begonia and Hydrangea, adding, that the 
idea of its being allied to the Folygonece, probably originated 
in the taste of the leaves, which bears assuredly a striking re- 
semblance to that of the foliage of different species of Rumex. 
Indeed, such is the agreeably acid flavour of the leaves of 
these plants, that the French colonists in the West Indies eat 
them under the name of Wild Sorrel. 
As a genus, it is found in the tropical parts of America, in 
several districts of the East Indies, in the Isles of France and 
Bourbon, according to Mr Brown, upon the Island of Joanna, 
and in Madagascar ; but none of the species have been detected 
in Africa, although the B. diptera of Dr yander, from Joanna, 
has erroneously gone under the appellation of B. Capensis. 
. Fig. 1 . Portion of a plant, natural size. Fig, 2. Male and female flowers. 
Fig. 3. Cluster of stamens. Fig. 4. Single stamen. Fig. 5. Styles 
and pistils. Fig. 6. Germen cut open, to show the 3 cells, and the 
3-winged receptacle of the seeds. Fig. 7. Capsule burst open, having 
discharged its seeds. — All magnified. 
