derived from the medicinal virtue of the flowers, of which, 
according to Browne, a tincture is formed by infusion in 
Wine or spirits, used’ in the leeward parts of the island for 
the same purposes as Laudanum, having the reputation of 
being a safe narcotic. 
A perennial villous plant; stem slender, weak, of a red- 
dish hue, herbaceous, but Jacquin says ‘not annual, climb- 
ing to the height of 10-15 feet. Leaves distant, pliant, 
covered with a soft pubescence, at the lower half broadly 
cordate, at the upper truncate with a crescent-shaped in- 
cisure, between the two acuminate lobes which form the 
horns of the sinus an incipient third one often appears 
with a small mucro, this is rounded and broader than long; 
petioles short and flexile. Flowers solitary, of distinct co- 
jours, but so combined as to afford thé appearance of a 
uniform dull red, about an inch and half over, villous and 
‘streaked on the outside, nearly scentless; peduncle pliant 
and slackened, the inner rank of the rays of the crown 
being very small and masked by the outer, is easily over- 
looked on slight inspection. Germen clothed by a dense 
silky pile. rit, from which the specific name is taken, 
is described as of a dingy red colour, pubescent, sometimes 
nearly of the size and form of an olive, sometimes spherical, 
sometimes.ovate, with six external parallel equidistant lon- 
gitudinal ridges, more or less raised; when ripe, according 
to Jacquin, it sometimes separates at the top into six valves. 
Rind thick, coriaceous and white within. Seeds black. 
__ Near akin to the Passrrrora capsularis of Linneus, 
which Mr. Dryander believes to be the same with the 
_punctata of Miss Lawrance’s drawings of the plants of this 
genus; but distinct from the capsularis of Miller, which 
appears by his own specimen in the Banksian Herbarium to_ 
be a mere variety of oblongata. In the Hortus Kewensis . 
rubra is stated to have been cultivated by Miller, on the 
presumption it was his capsularis; but his own specimen 
showing he had a different plant in view, the authority is 
irrelevant. ; 
‘ The drawing was made from a plant which flowered 
- late in the autumn, in the stove at Messrs. Whitley, Brames, 
and Milne s nursery, Parson’s Green, near Fulham, 
+ 
a A ray of the outer row of the crown. 5 The inner row of minute rays. 
«The nectary. d The partition between that and. the receptacle of the 
column, 
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