268 
AM AUYLLIDACEjE. 
native specimens and drawing it is longer, and the 
dried inflorescence might be mistaken for Capense, 
but the bulb and leaf agree with Bauer’s drawing 
of the plant of the Hort. Kew. 
40. Variabile. — Am. Variabilis. Jacq. H. Sell. 4. 426. 
Am. revoluta, /3. Bot. Reg. 8. 615. C. Crassifo- 
lium. Herb. Append. I have restored Jacquin’s 
appropriate name, variabilis, which I ought to 
have adopted at first. Foliis lsete viridibus erecto- 
arcuatis crassis germine gracili, floribus ortu albis 
rubro pallide extus notatis, dein saturate rubris. 
Species frigoris patiens, bulbulis quam maxime 
prolifera. This is the hardiest known species ; 
out of doors it preserves its leaves in winter longer 
than Capense, and it shoots earlier in the spring. 
Both this plant and revolutum have a slender 
germen, but the idea conceived from Jacquin’s 
plate by some persons of its cells being monosper- 
mous was erroneous. It leaves are deep green. 
The flowers turn to a rich purplish red, so that 
flowers of two colours are always on the same 
umbel, as represented by Jacquin. The figure in 
the Register was taken at too early a period for a 
just representation, before the expansion of the 
flowers. Mr. Ker considers Am. revoluta (Bot. Mag. 
1178.) to be this plant. The plant offered at Mr. 
Woodford’s sale, which Mr. Wykes, his gardener, 
asserted to be the one from which the figure was 
made, was not distinguishable from a common 
glaucous-leaved C. Capense ; and I observe in 
Mr. Ker’s description, he says of the leaves rather 
glaucous, which is not the case with any bulb I 
ever saw of variabile, which has the green very 
bright ; and if the plant had been variabile, the 
two decaying flowers in the figure would have 
been intensely red. The figure, therefore, if in- 
tended for C. variabile, is quite incorrect ; but 
it agrees better with some plants that I have of C. 
Capense. Mr. Ker draws a peremptory distinc- 
tion, that in variabile the tube is shorter than the 
limb, and in Capense longer; but in his own figure 
of Capense (Am. longifolia Bot. Mag. 18. 661.) it 
is shorter. Usually, however, the tube is longer than 
