STYLIDIUM SCANDENS. 
(Climbing Stylidium.) 
Class. Order. 
GYNANDRIA. TETRANDRIA. 
Natural Order. 
STYLIDIACEiE, 
Style-worts ( Veg. King.) 
Generic Character.— Calyx bilabiate. Corolla 
irregular, five-cleft, the fifth segment or labellum dis- 
similar, small, turned downwards, or very rarely 
extended forwards. Column reclinate, with a double 
bend, Anthers two-lobed ; lobes spreading. Stigma 
obtuse, undivided. Capsule two-celled.— R. Brown. 
Specific Character— Root perennial. Stem eighteen 
inches high, slender, shining, red, glabrous, branched. 
Leaves three inches-and-a-half long, whorl ed, crowded, 
linear, channelled, mucronate, rolled back at the 
apex in form of a cirrhus, throwing out long, fili- 
form, single, unbranched, red and shining roots 
from their axils. Bractece green, adpressed, one 
between each pedicel, and two nearly opposite above 
its middle, the former* small, ovate- acuminate, or 
larger and subulate, the latter very minute and scale- 
like. Corymbose racemes erect, clustered at the ex- 
tremities of the branches. Pedicels three to nine lines 
long, spreading, single-flowered, red, glabrous, filiform. 
Calyx superior, bilabiate, two to three-partite, green, 
glabrous, adpressed, segments elliptical, with paler 
edges, ciliated. Corolla about ten lines across, mono- 
petalous ; tube epigynous, nearly colourless, twice the 
length of the calyx ; limb five-partite. Labellum pale, 
reflected, ovate, acute, fringed with glandular hairs, 
auricled, auricles spreading, very slender, subulato- 
filiform, rose-coloured, twice the length of the labellum, 
with a few glandular hairs near the bases, under a high 
magnifying power appearing rough and serrulate ; 
other segments of the corolla, lilac, and imbricated in 
the bud, afterwards rose-coloured, paler below, darker 
in the throat, spreading or slightly reflected, obovate, 
sparingly ciliated, crenate at the apex, the two next 
the labellum crowned with an erect, generally emargi- 
nate, subspathulate scale, the two others naked. 
Column terminal, reflected over the labellum, and 
irritable, flat, white at its base, lilac in the middle, 
yellow towards its extremity, and there especially, but 
slightly also on its upper surface, glanduloso- pubes- 
cent. Anthers, after bursting, brownish-yellow, 
surrounded by a tuft of shining, transparent, at length 
yellow pubescence, bilobular, lobes divaricating, ellip- 
tical, pointed at the lower extremity, bursting along 
the front. Stigma in the centre between the anthers, 
green, at first hidden and small, but afterwards much 
enlarged, capitate and raised upon a conical neck, 
pubescent. Qermen green, becoming reddish-brown 
when ripe, ovate, glabrous, unilocular; ovules placed 
on a round central receptacle, having the mere rudi- 
ments of a dissepiment at its base. Sir W. Hooker, 
Bot. Mag. 3136. 
For the opportunity of figuring this well-known but pretty species of Stylidium, 
we are indebted to Messrs. Low and Co., of the Clapton Nursery, London, where 
it flowered in June, 1846, when a specimen was furnished to our artist. 
About forty-five species of this singular and elegant genus are known to 
botanists, all natives of New Holland, Van Dieman's Land, and different parts of 
Australia, where they grow abundantly on open sandy plains, fully exposed to the 
sun, but where the soil beneath is wet and spongy. About thirty kinds have been 
introduced, all of small stature, and although the blossoms are not very conspicuous 
or showy, yet all are pretty and interesting, and the most part are produced 
in racemes, but a few appear in spikes and corymbs. The prevailing colours are 
rose and pink in various shades and degrees. 
