HORTICULTURAL JOURNAL. 65 
ON THE CULTURE OF THE NEMATANTHUS LONGIPES. 
It is the good fortune of some plants to be everybody's favorites, and in 
everybody's collections. Of this class, a plant is no sooner hit upon by the 
collector in its native habitat, than it is sent across the boundless ocean, it 
may be, thousands of miles, with the collector's ticket attached, describing 
its wonderful beauty, is sought for by every cultivator, and the new plant 
soon becomes well known. Witness the Cissus discolor for an example. 
It is the same with varieties or hybrids of florist's flowers, where they 
have any sterling merit ; take Robinson's Defiance Verheyia as an ex- 
ample. Others are of a more humble nature, and to be found only in the 
collections of the curious ; especially is this so, if there are any difiiculties 
in the way of managing it, or if the flowers are not in abundance with 
common treatment. 
It is to the latter class that the subject now under notice more properly 
belongs, being found more among large collections than those of smaller 
extent ; and when met with, looking but indifl'erently, and occupying some 
spot where it plainly tells it is thought but little of. Our object, in these 
few remarks, is to place it in a more favorable light, as it certainly is 
deserving of a better fate than it generally receives. Its dissimilarity from 
other flowers, is some consideration in its favor. The flowers are produced 
from the axils of each leaf, generally singly but sometimes in pairs, being 
supported by thread-like stalks, which hang from four to six inches below 
the foliage or stem on which they are produced, giving the plant a very 
peculiar appearance. 
As the flowers are pendant and below the foliage altogether, it either 
requires to be grown on a single stem one or two feet high, or if dwarf, 
elevated when in flower sufiicient to look under the plant. The flowers 
belong to the ringent or gaping class of corollas, and are of a waxy-reddish 
color, being mottled, at the mouth, with the same color on a lighter ground. 
It IS, by no means, a compact growing plant, seldom producing any lateral 
shoot, and if stopped, is not very free in starting but from one eye ; hence, 
requires to be at least, three years old before any display much can be 
expected from it. 
We have a plant, now flowering, about three years old, which has twenty 
shoots, each of which has from five to ten flowers, of various stages of growth, 
hanging from them ; the shoots having extended some length, their own 
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