ACHIMENES PATENS. 
(Spreading Achimenes.) 
Class. 
DIDYNAMIA. 
Order. 
ANGIOSPERMIA, 
Natural Order. 
GESNERACEiE. 
Generic Character.— Calyx with its tube adnate to 
the ovary ; limb five-parted ; lobes lanceolate Corolla 
tubularly funnel shaped, often swollen at the base ; 
limb five-cleft ; lobes sub-equal, subrotund. Stamens 
four, didynamous ; anthers not cohering. Rudiment 
of the fifth stamen situated below the base of the 
corolla. Nectary glandular, in a small ring. Style 
slightly thickened towards the stigma, oblique, or %vith 
two separate lobes. Capsule nearly two-celled, two- 
valved ; placentas parietal, sub sessile. 
Specific Character. — Plant perennial. Roots tube- 
rous. Stems herbaceous, somewhat erect, pilose. Leaves 
opposite, ovate-acuminate, serrate, hispid above ; with 
rather unequal petioles. Pedicels longer than the calyx. 
Calyx pubescent. Corolla violet-coloured, saccate ; 
tube shorter than the limb-lobes ; limb very spreading ; 
spur conical. Stamens four times the length of the 
spur. Stigma somewhat equally bilobed. 
Some account of this plant is given at page 141 ; in a notice of it there, we have 
accidentally stated that it resembles A. grandiflora instead of longiflora in habit. 
Further intelligence of its history is contained in the following, from the pen of 
Mr. Hartweg, who discovered it, extracted from the " Journal of the Horticultural 
Society." Proceeding on a second botanical mission, Mr. H. arrived in the city of 
Mexico on the 3rd of December, 1845 ; after remaining there two days, he writes :— 
" I left for the Hacienda de Laureles, near Anganguco, where seven years previously 
I found Achimenes patens and heterophylla, the objects of this journey. Notwith- 
standing I recollected the locality where I saw them in flower in September, 1838, 
yet I had great difficulty in finding the roots, for not a leaf, however shrivelled up, 
could be seen. Under these circumstances I consider myself very fortunate in 
having found roots of some species of Achimenes." The roots mentioned were 
wholly those of A. patens ; from them plants have been raised, and very extensively 
distributed by the Horticultural Society. 
Mr. Theodore Hartweg, whose eminent success as a collector is so well known, 
forwarded plants of this beautiful species to England on first discovering it ; but 
they were not received alive. With respect to its value, it is at once a distinguished 
character, and sufficient recommendation, for a new member of so highly esteemed 
a genus of plants as that of Achimenes, to state that it is equal to those of its con- 
geners, to which it is most nearly allied, which is truly the case in the present 
