CHAP. XIX.] 
THE MADAGASCAR GROUP. 
411 
Among the most prominent characteristics of the Mada- 
gascar flora is the possession of a peculiar and isolated family, 
Chlsenacese, allied somewhat to the balsams, but presenting very 
anomalous characters. It consists of four genera and a number 
of species all entirely confined to the island. They are hand- 
some trees or shrubs, mostly with showy red flowers. One of 
them, Rhodolcena altivola, is a semi-scandent shrub with magni- 
ficent campanulate flowers the size of a camellia and of a 
brilliant purple colour. The genus Chrysopia consists of large 
forest trees with spreading crowns adorned with umbels or co- 
rymbs of large purple flowers. It belongs to the Clusiacese, and 
is most nearly allied to the South American genus Moronobea. 
The Colvillea, a peculiar genus of Leguminosae, is a tree with 
splendid scarlet flowers; and there are a large number of 
other peculiar genera more or less remarkable, Combretaceae 
with splendid flowers abound in Madagascar itself, though they 
are rare in the Mascarene islands; while the Ravenala, or 
“ traveller’s tree ; ” the extraordinary lattice-leaved Ouvirandra ; 
the Poinciana regia , one of the most gorgeous of flowering trees ; 
and the long-spurred Angrcecum sesquipedale, one of the most 
elegant and remarkable of orchids, are among its vegetable 
wonders. 1 
Of the flora of the smaller Madagascarian islands we possess 
a much fuller account, owing to the recent publication of Mr. 
Baker’s Flora of the Mauritius and the Seychelles, including also 
Rodriguez. The total number of species in this flora is 1,058, 
more than half of which (536) are exclusively Mascarene — that 
is, found only in some of the islands of the Madagascar group, 
while nearly a third (304) are endemic or confined to single islands. 
Of the widespread plants sixty-six are found in Africa but net 
in Asia, and eighty-six in Asia but not in Africa, showing a similar 
Asiatic preponderance to what is said to occur in Madagascar. 
With the genera, however, the proportions are different, for I 
find by going through the whole of the generic distributions as 
given by Mr. Baker, that out of the 440 genera of wild plants 
1 This sketch of the Flora of Madagascar is taken chiefly from a series 
of articles by M. Emile Blanchard in the Revue des Deux Mondes. Yol. 
CL (1872). 
