!(i'9 
CLIANTHUS PUNICEUS. 
(CKIMSON GLORY-FLOWER.) 
CLASS. ORDER, 
DIADELPHIA. DECANDRIA. 
NATURAL ORDER. 
LEGUMINOS^. 
Generic Character. — Calyx five toothed. Vexillum turned backwards, and ending in a point, shorter 
than the keel. Stamina ten, all fertile, diadelphous. Pod inflated, many seeded. Seeds kidney- 
shaped. 
Specific Character. — A smooth branching shrub, gi'owing about three or four feet high. Leaves pin- 
nate, with an odd one, leaflets oblong, blunt, bright green colour above, bluish beneath. Raceme 
pendulous, many-flowered. Calyx bright green, cut into five sharp pointed teeth. Vexillum 
dark crimson, having a few longitudinal white marks at the base. Wings dark crimson, blunt, 
rather shorter than the vexillum. Keel bright crimson, tinged with orange, approaching to light 
yellow at the base, much longer than the wings. 
Synonyms Donia punicea. — Z)ow, Mill. Diet, ii, 468. 
This new and most beautiful shrub is a native of New Zealand, whence seeds 
of it were sent to this country by the Missionaries in that part. The native 
name is " Kowaingutu Kaka" or Parrot's Bill, most probably called so from the 
shape of the flower just before it becomes fully expanded, when it bears resemblance 
to the bill of a bird. In the Horticultural Transactions, the following excellent 
account of this fine plant is given, and being nearly all that is known about it we 
shall extract it as it stands : — 
" When planted in a peat border in the open air, where it succeeds best, it forms 
a half herbaceous evergreen shrub, not very unlike an evergreen vetch, or, more 
correctly speaking, a scarlet Colutea (^Sutherlmidia frutescens). Its leaves are 
smooth, pinnated, and of rather a succulent texture, consisting of about eight 
pairs with an odd one." 
" The stem is entirely free from furrows or angles. The flowers grow in oval 
clusters, hanging down from the axils of the leaves upon the lateral branches ; each 
flower is rather more than three inches from the tip of the standard to the top of 
the keel ; the petals are of a light bright rich crimson, without any mottling or 
marking ; the standard, which is of a ovate-lanceolate figure, and much tapered to 
the point, is reflexed so as almost to lie back upon the calyx ; the wings are very 
much shorter than the keel, the point of which is so much prolonged as to look like 
the beak of some bird, although it must be confessed not much like that of a 
parrot. 
I " The flowers are succeeded by brownish black pods, two inches and a half long, 
VOL. II.— NO. XX. z 
