A SHORT DISSERTATION, 
This beautiful and extended tribe of plants, at present so much 
admired and cultivated in our British Gardens, is but of recent 
introduction, at least the major part of them, as antecedent to the 
year 17t2 the few species then known were the E. vulgaris, 
Ei Tetralix, E. cinerea, and E. vagans, natives; the E. Daboecii, 
from Ireland; the E. arborea from Madeira in 1748; the E. her¬ 
bacea or carnea in 1763 from Switzerland; the E. mediterranea 
in 1765 from Minorca; the E. scoparia, E. viridi-purpurea, 
E. australis, E. ciliaris, and E. umbellata, from Portugal, between 
the years 1768 and 1707. The two other European species we 
possess, the E. stricta, and E. multiflora, natives of Spain, have 
been but 14 years in cultivation witlius; and the African species 
found within the district of the Cape of Good Hope and the adja¬ 
cent territory, which have swelled the Genus to so great an extent, 
and by the extreme brilliance of their flowers have contributed so 
much to the present splendour of our green-houses, were unknown 
to our English botanists, but by name, till the above £era. In the 
year 1772 seeds of two species were sent from the Cape.—Both 
vegetated. The first was the E. tubiflora of the Sp. Plant, of Lin¬ 
naeus, the other the E. concinna. In 1774 the superb collection at 
Kew was enriched by nearly 20 species sent by Mr. F. Masson, His 
Majesty^s collector at the Cape, for which we refer to the 2nd voL 
of the Catalogue of that garden. From this period, till within 
these few years, the accession has been so rapid, .so many different 
collectors producing new species, that it would be only a list of 
names to enumerate them, and no way illustrate the present sub- 
