TI1K HOSE 01-' JERICHO. 
45.5 
Among the remarkable Avorks which our 
author has published, his monograph on the 
so-called Rose of Jericho is not the least so. 
It would appear that Prof. Storms had 
cultivated that far-famed plant in his own. 
garden since the year 1603 ; and the circum- 
stances which gave rise to the publication of 
his interesting treatise upon it, are thus re- 
lated by him : — " When a few years ago, in 
one of our public academical disputations 
(called quotlibeticas)," he says in his preface, 
" I had resolved three questions regarding the 
Rose of Jericho, proposed to me by the Pre- 
sident, and, according to local custom, I had 
somewhat enlarged on my subject. I could 
not help perceiving that my auditory seemed 
much pleased with what they had heard ; so 
much so, indeed, that some expressed a wish 
to have it in writing, others to see it in public 
print, (and among the latter number was 
Justus Lipsius, a man whose name is cele- 
brated throughout the world, and who will for 
ever be remembered in history for his sin- 
gular learning and piety,) pressing me hard, 
on the plea that my discourse deserved being 
made generally known." 
The work is divided into forty-two chap- 
ters, and Storms finds occasion to quote in it 
the names of some fifty different authors, 
whose erroneous opinions on the subject of 
our plant he submits to his criticism ; as he 
might have those of more modern botanists. 
The description which he himself gives, and 
which is very correct even to the details of 
the ovary, we will quote from the preface, in 
his own words. They read thus : — " Hieri- 
chuntis rosa frutex est palmaris altitudinis, 
inodorus, tribus ab una radice candicibus, 
raro pluribus, sed in plurimos ramulos lig- 
nosos, duriusculos ac lentos, rubri, subflavi 
aut partim utriusque coloris, divisis, constans ; 
qui introrsum flexi ac convoluti quasi orbem 
quemdam constituunt : folia olea3 aut mali 
Punicas similia : fiores intus violas Candidas ; 
quibus succedunt folliculi oblongi, racematim 
cohasrentes, foeniculi semine majoi'es, in quo- 
rum singulis quatuor seminula parva rotunda, 
oblonga et depressa, semine milii majora, 
fulvi coloris, distinctis locellis seu capsulis 
continentur." 
Our author refutes the opinion of those 
who class the Rose of Jericho, which he shows 
to be any thing but a rose, with either of the 
species Amomum, Amomis, Aspalathus, Con- 
volvulus, or Erica ; and then proceeds to state 
his reasons, why it should be comprehended 
rather in the species of violets : not that he 
commits the error of positively assimilating it 
to the latter, but " because, if both the viola 
lutea and the viola jxtirpurea" he concludes, 
p. 49, 50, " are thus classified ; it would 
seem not altogether inappropriate to include 
also the Rose of Jericho in the same specif,-, 
and to call it rather the Violet than the Rose 
of Jericho. . . . I willingly admit, however, 
that thus not only the Rose of Jericho, but also 
the Amomum and other similar plants, might 
be comprehended in the species of violets," &c. 
He also treats fully of the different qualities 
of, as well as the popular superstitions regard- 
ing, our plant ; and a discussion as to the 
time of its flowering concludes his mono- 
graph, one of the most ancient of the kind we 
possess. 
Prof. Kickx of Ghent, has named that 
species of fern, which he separated in 1835, 
the Acrostichum septentrionafe of Linne, 
in honour of our author: Stormesia ;* and 
it is he, we believe, who, on that occasion, 
first directed attention to the work which 
forms the subject of our remarks. In a sub- 
sequent publication, f the same distinguished 
botanist has satisfactorily proved in regard to 
the Anastatica Hierochuntina, that Storms 
had "la gloire de definir le premier les 
notions sur l'espece." He did so many years 
before Ray, whose definition is generally con- 
sidered as the most ancient ; but the mono- 
graph of Storms having appeared in 1607, 
and the work of Ray not till 1682, the prior 
claim of the Belgian savant to that honour 
cannot well be called into doubt. 
It is deserving of notice, as remarked by 
Prof. Morren,"| that so far back as the year 
1633, the Anastatica appears in the herbal of 
the Abbey of Dilighem, among the culinary 
plants cultivated in the garden of that esta- 
blishment. Nor must we forget that, at the 
period of which we speak, Belgium was the 
first horticultural country in Europe. Every 
inhabitant was an amateur of flowers, § and no 
expense was spared to gratify the general 
taste. || These amateurs, we are informed 
by Matth. de Lobel,^" imported plants and 
flowers from every part of the globe, and in 
Belgium a greater variety of horticultural 
produce was to be seen, than in the rest of 
Europe together. J. v. G. 
* Flore Cryptogamique des Environs de Louvain. — 
Bruxelles, 1835. 8vo. (p. 11.) 
| Esquisses sur les Outrages de quelques anciens 
Naturalistes Beiges.— Bruxelles, 1842. 8vo. 
% Annales de la Soc. Koyale d'Agric. et de Bot. de 
Gand.— Bruxelles, 1848. 8vo. (p. 457.) 
§ Van Hulthem, Discours sur l'Etat ancien et mo- 
derne de l'Agric. et de la Bot. dans les Pays-Bas. — 
Gand, 1817. Svo. 
|| Gorop. Becani Origines Antverp. — intv. 1569, in 
fol. (in pref.) 
«lf Plantarum seu Stirp. Historia. — Antv. 1576, in 
fol. (in pref.) 
