NEW AND RARE PLANTS, 
45 
dominions. In an account of the plant transmitted to the Geographical Society, 
" It was on the first of January this year, while contending with the difficulties 
of nature imposed in different forms to our progress up the river Berbice (in British 
Guiana), that we arrived at a point where the river expanded and formed a 
currentless basin ; some object on the southern extremity of the basin attracted my 
attention ; it was impossible to form any idea what it could be, and animating the 
crew to increase the rate of their paddling, we were shortly afterwards opposite 
the object which had raised my curiosity — a vegetable wonder ! All calamities 
were forgotten ; I felt as a botanist, and felt myself rewarded : a gigantic leaf, 
from five to six inches in diameter, salver-shaped with a broad rim, of a light 
green above, and a vivid crimson below, resting upon the water. Quite in 
character with the wonderful leaf was the luxuriant flower, consisting of many 
hundred petals, passing in alternate tints from pure white to rose and pink. The 
smooth water was covered with the blossoms, and as I rowed from one to the 
other, I always observed something new to admire. The leaf on its upper surface 
is of a bright green ; in form almost orbicular, except that on one side it is slightly 
bent in ; its diameter measured from five to six feet ; around the whole margin 
extended a rim, from three to five inches high, on the inside light green, like the 
surface of the leaf, on the outside like the leafs lower surface of a bright crimson. 
The ribs are very prominent, almost an inch high, radiating from a common centre ; 
there are eight principal ones, with a good many others branching off from them ; 
these are crossed again by a membrane or bands at right angles, which give the 
whole the appearance of a spider's web, and are beset with prickles ; the veins 
contain air-cells like the petiole and flower-stem. The divisions of the ribs and 
bands are visible on the upper surface of the leaf by which it appears areolated. 
The young leaf is convolute and expands but slowly. The prickly stem ascends 
with the young leaf till it has reached the surface ; by the time it is developed, its 
own weight depresses the stem, and it floats on the water. The stalk of the flower 
is an inch thick near the calyx, and is studded with sharp elastic prickles, about 
three quarters of an inch in length. The calyx is four-leaved, each sepal upwards 
of seven inches in length and three inches in breadth ; at the base they are 
white inside, reddish brown and prickly outside ; the diameter of the calyx is from 
twelve to thirteen inches ; on it rests the magnificent corolla, which, when fully 
developed, completely covers the calyx with its hundred petals. When it first 
opens, it is white, with pink in the middle, which spreads over the whole flower 
the more it advances in age, and it is generally found the next day altogether of a 
pink colour ; as if to enhance its beauty, it is sweet-scented. Like others of its 
tribe, the petals and stamens pass gradually into each other, and many petaloid 
leaves may be observed which have vestiges of an anther. The petals next to the 
leaves of the calyx are fleshy, and possess air-cells, which certainly must contribute 
to the buoyancy of the flower. The seeds of the many-celled fruit are numerous, 
