BEAUFORTIA SPLENDENS. 
Class. 
POLYADELPHIA. 
(Splendid Beaufortia.) 
Natural Order. 
MYRTACEiE. 
Order. 
POLYANDRIA. 
Generic Character. — Tube of calyx turbinate, 
limb five-parted, lobes acute. Petals five. Bundles of 
stamens five, opposite the petals. Anthers inserted by 
the base, bifid at the apex ; lobes deciduous. Style 
filiform. Capsule corticate, inerusted to the tube of 
the calyx, three-celled ; cells one-seeded. — Bon's Gard. 
and Botany. 
Specific Character.— Plant an evergreen shrub ; 
branches slender, rather straggling. Leaves oval, broad 
at their base, sessile, blunt, alternate, entire, smooth, 
light-green, small. Flowers in rather short clusters, 
scarlet. Stamens in rather long parcels, on a long 
claw. Style very long. 
' All we know of the history of this plant is, that it is a native of New Holland, 
from whence it is stated to have been introduced in L830, and that Baxter, a 
traveller in that country, and collector of its plants, is given as the author of its 
specific title. 
The genus Beaufortia was founded by R Brown, and comprises a few species 
only of interesting plants. The present member is free-growing, somewhat open- 
branched ; its branches are rather slender, and bear their flowers in the early winter 
months. It differs from B. decussata, formerly depicted in our pages, in being less 
robust, and much more lively in appearance, especially when in bloom, in conse- 
quence of the difference in the colour of their inflorescence. 
A class of plants, of which the members of this genus, those of Melaleuca, 
Calothamnns, &c, are instances, in the greenhouse, and Inga and others, in the 
stove, do not receive the attention they are worthy of ; vested as their beauty is in 
what is usually considered, viewing them in an ornamental light, the inferior parts of 
the flower, and many of them not being of a very showy character, they are passed 
over for more gaudy, but less deserving things. 
Independent of their flowers, which are indeed highly interesting, and especially 
beautiful, as is discovered when they are attentively regarded, they are distinguished 
by a great diversity of habit, difference of foliage, &c, and they are very hardy : we 
have known them, the greenhouse section at least, flourish and bloom under the 
hardest usage. A collection of plants with the style of inflorescence, alone, of those 
under consideration, would constitute a fine group, and be most engaging. 
VOL. XIII. — no. cli. u 
