CHAP. II. 
LETTERS FROM THE CAPITAL. 
45 
five months into the interior, and I willingly left a plant in 
the botanic gardens there. Since my return to England, I 
have had much satisfaction in presenting specimens of this rare 
plant to the Royal Gardens at Kew, to the gardens of the Hor¬ 
ticultural Society at Chiswick, and to those at Regent’s Park, 
and to the Crystal Palace. 
The plants at these places, especially those at Kew, appear 
to thrive remarkably well, the leaves being equal in size and 
beauty to any which I saw in Madagascar. Among a few 
comparatively small plants which I grew in a glass milk- 
pan, with but a small depth of earth, one flowered during the 
past summer. The seed ripened quickly, and fell upon the 
earth at the bottom of the pan, where it soon germinated, 
and in the same pan with the parent plant seven or eight 
young seedling plants are growing with pale green leaves 
half an inch long. The length of the leaf-stalks seems to be 
regulated by the depth of the water; when this is shallow 
these are short, as seen in the annexed engraving, but when 
the water is deep the stalks are long, as represented by the 
single leaf on the side. The leaves are always just beneath the 
surface, but the flower-stem rises above the water. Sir W. J. 
Hooker published a minute scientific description of the ouvi-" 
randra, and a figure of the plant, in the “ Botanical Journal,” 
very soon after the plant had been brought to England. 
Fifteen days after our letters had been sent to the capital 
of Madagascar, we heard that answers had been received. On 
the following morning, having been invited to receive com¬ 
munications from the officers of the government, the captain 
of our vessel, Mr. Cameron, and myself, went to M. De Las- 
telle’s, where we met the chief judge, the harbour master, the 
chief of the customs, and other officers, and partook of a most 
sumptuous breakfast provided by our host. After breakfast 
the chief judge delivered to the captain the answers of the 
queen to the memorial of the merchants at Mauritius, for 
