FEBRUARY. 
39 
beautiful M. iUustris and 31. roseo-jncta; while at the great International 
Show M. Linden produced no fewer than twenty-five additional novelties of 
this family, several of which, though not equalling in beauty the species 
we have named, will be welcome additions to our stoves, and will give us 
in the Maranta family alone, the means of forming a very choice and varied 
collection of plants of ornamental foliage. 
Of Greenhouse Flowering plants—between which and half-hardy sub¬ 
jects the line is not very easily drawn—perhaps the gorgeous Chilian 
Amaryllid, Habranthus fulgens, introduced by Messrs. Backhouse & Son, 
claims a first place, as will be apparent wdien we state that it has flowers of 
the richest scarlet, and almost rivals a Hippeastum in magnitude. Our col¬ 
lections of greenhouse Bulbs have received further accessions in the beautiful 
Sparaods pulchernma and Gladiolus Papilio , of Southern Africa, species which, 
it may be hoped, will serve to engage the sympathies of cultivators once 
more on behalf of the beautiful South African genera, Ixia, Sparaxis, 
Homeria, Gladiolus, and their allies, and secure for them a share of the 
favour of modern gardeners, which they richly merit. The Sparaxis, with 
its large bell-shaped blood-red flowers in gracefully deflexed panicles, and 
the Gladiolus with its delicately-tinted and beautifully-marked 'widely- 
expanded flowers, are well worth growing on their own account. Finally, 
in this category, we have to mention two neat trailing species of Nierem- 
bergia , named respectively N. Veitchii, from Tucuman, and N. rividaris , from 
La Plata, the first with obovate-oblong leaves, and long-tubed lilac flowers, 
and the second with the leaves oblong-spathulate, and the flowers of a 
creamy white, both half-hardy perennials, which may afford some useful 
variety where it is always acceptable—namely, in our summer flower 
gardens. 
Amongst New Greenhouse Foliage plants occur several Ferns, and 
notably two New Caledonian Lomarias, of great interest and beauty. One 
of these is Lomaria ciliata, which promises to be a charming dendroid 
species, and is remarkable for its curious retusely-Iobed fringed fronds. The 
other is Lomaria gibba Bellii, in which one of the most elegant of cultivated 
species has yielded us a still more beautiful ramose and cristate variety. A 
third Fern from the same island, Asplenium nova Caledonia, is scarcely less 
ornamental, for having its decompound fronds cut up into a multiplicity of 
rachiform segments, it must necessarily rank amongst the more elegant of 
its race. These three are plants requiring a warm greenhouse. The 
more temperate greenhouse and plant case have had a valuable accession 
in the new Pteris serrulata polydactyla, which may be welcomed as a graceful- 
habited many-fingered form of one of the commonest but yet one of the most 
elegant and useful evergreen Ferns in cultivation. We have also become 
acquainted during the past year with at least two variegated Ferns of the 
half-hardy (possibly Lardy), class. These are both handsomely marked, 
and they are all the more interesting, since before their appearance the 
honour of representing variegated Ferns in our gardens seemed to have 
been appropriated by the Pteris family. One of the new acquisitions is 
Athyrium Goringianmn pictum, a graceful summer-fronded plant, having tri¬ 
angular pendent bipinnate fronds, the pinnae marked with red midribs, which 
have a grey band on either side. The other is Lastrea Sieboldii variegata, a 
stately and striking half-hardy evergreen Fern, in which the broad divisions of 
the frond are distinctly striated in a transverse direction with white bars. 
Then w r e have just seen added to our collections of dwarf pitcher-leaved 
plants the curious Sarracenia psittacina, an inhabitant of the Southern 
