126 " PLEROMA KUNTHIANUM. 
The petals are of good texture, and fit very compactly together, which, with 
their large size, and the white speck at the base of each, enable them to form 
a blossom of a very superior order. 
The species has been represented as one of tardy growth. This, however, is 
by no means the truth, under proper management ; for with genial culture, it 
grows vigorously and flowers freely. Several cultivators, nevertheless, have failed 
to obtain blossoms even from strong healthy specimens, — a disappointment which 
seems to be owing chiefly to the neglect of encouragement to grow early in the 
season, and of proper steps to mature the wood in autumn. This opinion receives 
strength from the facts, that the flowers are only produced at the extreme point of 
the summer's shoots, and that the 
latter will grow as much as four 
or five feet before they bloom. 
This rapidity of growth points 
out the necessity of pruning very 
closely after flowering, in order to 
preserve the lower part of the 
plant clothed with foliage, and 
also with a view to obtain an 
equally stout growth in the suc- 
ceeding season. Very fine bushes 
may thus be produced in a few 
years ; but it is not requisite to 
have old specimens to obtain 
flowers. Mr. Loraine's plant 
was reared from a cutting the 
previous autumn, and headed down 
to three or four eyes in the spring. 
A similar specimen was flowered 
about the same time by Mr. 
Moor, gardener to E. Handbury, 
Esq., of Stamford-hill. 
The specific name was given in 
compliment to M. Kunth, the cele- 
brated Prussian botanist, and co- 
adjutor of Humboldt and Bonpland 
in the publication of the plants discovered by those distinguished travellers during 
their well-known journey through Tropical America. 
