474 THE HOT-HOUSE. [Aug. 
fleeted at the point; the three inner ones smaller by half) biform- 
ed, singularly divided into a lower hastate and an upper ovate divi- 
sion, by a depressed intersection; the upper division is of the 
richest scarlet imaginable, variegated by a bright golden yellow. 
The Filament, is a cuniculated or piped triquetral column. The 
Anthers, are sessile, erect, bearing their pollen on the outside, con- 
niving at the point, diverging below to admit the exit of the stig- 
mas. The Germen, is obtusely trigonal, three celled. Style, the 
length of the filamental column, through the hollow of which it 
passes. Stigmas, three, filiform, bifid. Capsule, oblong, obtusely 
trigonal three-celled. Seeds, in double rows in each cell and round. 
Hernandez, a Spanish physician, who was sent to Mexico, by 
Philip II. King of Spain, informs us, that it grew wild about that 
city, and was much cultivated for its excessive beauty, and for the 
medicinal virtues of its roots, being, as he terms it, a " frigefacient 
in fevers, and also a promoter of fecundity in women/' 
This flower has no scent; but in splendid beauty, it has scarcely 
any competitor. It is born to display its glory but a few hours, 
and then literally melts away; but to compensate for this sudden 
decline, it continues to produce flowers for several weeks. The 
latter end of this month is generally the season of its bloom. 
It is properly a Green-house plant, succeeds best in light mould, 
and is easily propagated by seed, from which the plants will flower 
the second year. The bulbs and offsets may be taken up in Octo- 
ber, when the leaves are decayed, and kept in dry sand, saw-dust or 
rolled up in dry moss till March; but they must be carefully preserv- 
ed from frost. Or they may be replanted immediately in pots of 
fresh earth, and placed in the Green-house; giving them but very 
little water, till they begin to vegetate in spring. 
THE HOT-HOUSE, 
Pine-Apples. 
The care of the fruiting pines being the same in this month as in 
the last, is unnecessary to be repeated; as likewise the propagation 
of the plants by crowns and suckers, as well as the shifting of those 
succession pines which are expected to produce fruit next season. 
Let this shifting, where neglected last month, be done, if possi- 
ble, in the first or second week of this, that the plants may have 
time to establish strong roots, and to be advanced in free and vigo- 
rous growth before winter. For the method of shifting, see page 
457. 
