ERANTHEMUM STR-fCTUM. 
(Upright Erautkemum. 
Class. Order. 
DIANDRIA. MONOGYNIA. 
Natural Order. 
ACANTHACEiE. 
Generic Character.— Calyx five-cleft, tubular, 
erect, skinny, persistent. Corolla monopeta.lous, fun- 
nel-shaped, tube slender, very long, limb five-parted, 
flat, lobes obovate and equal. Stamens two ; filaments 
spiral at the base ; anthers nearly ovate, compressed, 
and protruding beyond the orifice. Style ovate. Stigma 
erect, unequal. Ovarium spatulate, compressed, two- 
valved. Ovules solitary, lentiform. 
Specific Character. — « A small shrub, four or five 
feet high, slightly covered with short hairs. Stem almost 
round, jointed, sending forth four-sided slender 
branches in remote pairs. Leaves about four inches 
long, acute at each end, their margins somewhat revo- 
lute and crenulate, smooth and shining, of a peculiar, 
greyish-green colour above ; very pale, with prominent, 
hairy, and reticulated nerves and veins below. The 
uppermost, or floral leaves, at the base of the spikes, 
approach to the size and figure of the bracts. Petioles 
about an inch long, flattened above, and slightly mar- 
ginated by the decurrent base of the leaf. Spikes 
solitary, erect, from one to two feet long. Rachis 
sharply four-sided, almost four- winged. Flowers large, 
dark blue, opposite in alternate pairs, which become 
remote as the spike elongates. Bracts adpressed, im- 
bricating, with their ends cuneate-lanceolar, dark- 
green, acute, ciliate, about an inch long : the lowermost 
barren and becoming floral leaves ; interior two very 
small, scarcely longer than the five calycine segments, 
and, like them, linear, pubescent. Tube of the corolla 
slender, pubescent, slightly enlarged towards the 
mouth, about twice the length of the outer bract. 
Segments obovate, truncate, spreading and flat, equal, 
very pale below ; two filiform barren stamina between 
the filaments. Anthers in the mouth of the corolla, 
with parallel cells."— Dr. Lindley, Bot. Reg., 867. 
Amongst our winter-flowering stove plants, several species of Eranthemum 
deserve to be particularly mentioned ; not so much on account of winter being their 
blooming season, as for the brilliancy of the colours of their flowers. First, the old 
E. pulchellum, figured Vol. II., page 55, is deserving of particular notice; it is a 
very free flowerer, and although its foliage is somewhat coarse, yet the intense 
brightness of its sky-coloured blossoms renders it a desirable plant : E. crenulatum 
and E. fcecundmn also bear flowers of different shades of purple, and they have 
superior foliage. Our present subject, which few plants can surpass in brilliancy 
of colour, is, perhaps, the very best of all. 
This very fine species was introduced from the East Indies so long ago as 1823, 
through the instrumentality of J. Slater, Esq., of Newick Park, near Uckfield, who 
raised it from Nepal seeds. It has since that time been pretty well distributed, and 
is now found in most good collections throughout the country, and is very deservedly 
esteemed. 
