and Affinities of Trapella. 77 
leaf, and often the shoot formed remains insignificant (as in 
Fig. 1). 
The bilabiate corolla has, Dr. Henry says in his note 
accompanying the material, a limb pale blue above, passing 
into a tube below which is yellow both outside and in 1 . It 
would appear that only one flower is in bloom at once on 
any shoot. After the corolla has fallen away five spines 
arise below, and alternating with, the calyx-lobes. These 
spines give the fruit an extremely characteristic appearance ; 
and this, taken with its floating habit, has led the Chinese, 
Dr. Henry informs us, to speak of the plant (from its re- 
semblance to Trap a) as fich. ling-chio, i. e. ‘ iron T rapa 5 ; the 
.adjective ‘ iron ’ indicating the uselessness of the plant, in 
contrast to Trap a itself, which is of great value economically. 
The word seems to be used in a sense analogous to that in 
which we use ‘ dog, 5 e. g. dog-rose, etc. 
The plant grows in 1 —2, feet of water in a pond in the 
neighbourhood of Ichang, in the province of Hupeh ; and the 
material which has been investigated by me was gathered 
July i8th-2ist last— less than nine months ago at the time of 
writing. 
Soon after the first material of Trapella was received at 
Kew, M. Maximowicz of St. Petersburg received from a 
correspondent at Tokio, Japan, fragments, which though in- 
sufficient to describe, rendered it probable that it was at 
any rate a species of our genus. On the strength of this 
I hunted through the illustrated Japanese plant-books in the 
Kew Library, and in volume 76 of the beautiful f Phonzo 
Zoufou,’ devoted to aquatics, occurs a coloured hand- 
drawing 2 * * of a plant, undoubtedly belonging to our genus, 
1 In his memorandum accompanying the first received dry specimens, Dr. Henry 
speaks of the corolla as being white above, so that the shade of blue is probably 
very faint. 
2 In this figure a floating stem only, with fruits, is drawn ; no flowers are given, 
nor any of the submerged oblong leaves. The leaves are rather more deeply 
cut than in our plant, and adventitious roots are represented arising from nodes at 
which are inserted floating leaves. The fruits, though fancifully drawn, belong 
undoubtedly to Trapella . 
