PRICKLY PEARS NOW WILL IN INDIA. 
299 
think that Roxburgh probably gave to it the name as it stands in his 
Hortus Bengalensis, identifying it with the Tuna elatior spinis valadis 
nigricantibus of Sherrard’s garden w^bich is what we now know as 
Opuntia elatior. Voigt tells us that Opuntia elatior of the Calcutta 
gardens had a purplish-yellow flower : this if it may be regarded, and I 
think it may, as a very loose substitute for the splendidly accurate 
rubescente flavus that we have seen on the label of Eottler‘’s speci- 
men of Opuntia elatior , supports the contention that Roxburgh's Opuntia 
Tuna elatior is the plant which Anderson, as represented by Bottler's 
herbarium, had as Cactus Ficus-indica, The conclusion then is that 
Anderson obtained the plant, and Roxburgh receiving it from Anderson 
identified it as Cactus Tuna elatior and grew it as such at Calcutta ; but 
that Bottler, from whatever source we do not know, gave it the name of 
Cactus Ficus-indica in his herbarium. 
Is not Anderson’s ©puntia Tuna, Opuntia Billenii ?— In 1902 I 
collected and dried some specimens of undoubted Opuntia Billenii at 
Vizagapatam. During the nine years that I have kept them, their 
yellow thorns have darkened considerably. This observation makes it 
seem probable that Bottler's Cactus Tuna which differs in appearance 
from 0. Billenii in nothing but the colour of the thorns is a specimen of 
Opuntia Billenii the thorns of which have gone black through age ; 
indeed if the thorns of Opuntia Dillenli blacken completely, then 
certainly it is Opuntia Billenii. It is not a species which Anderson is 
recorded as sending to Roxburgh. 
Roxburgh’s second Tuna may have been true Opuntia Tuna * 
For identifying Roxburgh's Cactus Tuna major, we turn to Dillen's two 
figures ; one of them may represent Opuntia Bille^iii and the other 
Opuntia Tuna. Voigt in his Hortus Suburb anus Calcuttensis recorded 
an Opuntia Tuna " with a reddish flower as being in the Calcutta 
gardens. If this was Roxburgh's plant then he may have had the 
true Opuntia Tuna^ 
Roxburgh’s Cactus Opuntia cannot be deteriiiined .-—Roxburgh's 
Cactus Opuntia by its name ought to have been Opuntia nan a, i.e.^ the 
Opuntia vulgaris of most authors (for which see the note on p. 28 7j ; 
but I have no means of proving this. Voigt compiling thirty years 
later recorded Opuntia vulgaris as being in the Calcutta garden, but 
not flowering. 
The Manila Opuntia : — The Opuntia introduced from Manila, which 
has no place in the Hortus Bengalensis^ but is mentioned in the 
