i i le a at i ol 
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DR. J. D. HOOKER ON WELWITSCHIA. 3 
resemblances of structure with Conifere and Casuarinee, and even with Proteacee, I 
believe we have here the type of a new family.” 
During the autumn of 1861, and some months before the arrival in England of Dr. 
Welwitsch’s specimens, Sir William Hooker received from Mr. Thomas Baines, an accom- 
plished artist, then travelling in the Damara Country, a box containing some admirable 
coloured drawings illustrating the vegetation of that country, together with the cones and 
a sketch of a plant which I at once recognized as generically, if not specifically, identical 
with that discovered by Dr. Welwitsch. Unfortunately the box was not accompanied 
by any letter, nor the specimens and drawings by descriptions: they appear to have 
been collected in lat. 24° or 25° S., about 500 miles south of Cape Negro, where Dr. 
Welwitsch found his plant. They were gathered on the 10th of May, and were packed 
without being dried, along with some gigantic succulent aloe leaves and flowers; and not 
arriving at Kew until late in the following autumn, they were then all in a very decayed 
state. The cones contained ripe seeds, the albumen of which was perfectly rotten; by 
careful dissection of them, however, and hardening them with alcohol, I had no difficulty 
in proving their great similarity in development and structure with the seeds of Cycadee 
and Gnetacee. Mr. Baines’s sketch of the plant (Plate I. fig. 2) somewhat differs from 
Dr. Welwitsch’s description, in presenting the appearance of five leaves spreading on the 
ground, instead of two only; they are, however, curled, and split into thongs, though not 
so deeply as Dr. Welwitsch describes. Mr. Baines’s sketch is, however, more artistic than 
scientific; the insertion of the leaves is not precisely indicated, nor are their bases sepa- 
rated. From the copy, it will be seen that it may represent a plant with five leaves, or two 
split respectively into two and three, or even one leaf split into five! The name “ Tumbo” 
is appended by Mr. Baines to the drawing of this plant and also to that of an aloe; but 
on a slip of paper accompanying the specimen, he has written, “ Branch of the cones of a 
plant called by the Hottentots ‘Ghories,’ and by the Damaras ‘Nyanka-Hykamkop.’” 
On the arrival of Mr. Baines’s specimens and drawings, I immediately communicated 
the fact to Dr. Welwitsch, urging him to send his materials to Kew as he had proposed ; 
and as he had done me the honour of desiring that I should publish them, I offered to do so. 
At the same time I directed his attention to the fact that the name of “ Twmboa,” which 
he had proposed, was, according to Mr. Baines, applicable to various plants, whilst other 
names were applied to this; and I suggested the propriety of his withdrawing it, and 
permitting me to replace it by that of Welwitschia* mirabilis. To this Dr. Welwitsch at 
once consented ; and two fine young specimens, together with flowers, and cones with un- 
ripe seeds, soon afterwards arrived, along with his original drawings, proving the identity 
of his plant with that of Mr. Baines; and I have now the pleasure of commemorating 
Dr. Welwitsch’s indefatigable and successful botanical labours in tropical Africa by attach- 
ing his name to a discovery of his own, and one that I do not hesitate to consider the most 
wonderful, in a botanical point of view, that has been brought to light during the present 
century ; for an attentive study of the structure of its vascular system, as well as of its 
reproductive organs, and of the evidences we have of its functional peculiarities and mode 
of development, will disclose in all these points very singular anomalies, which even 
* Welwitschia, Reich. Handb. p. 94, is reduced by Bentham to Gilia (DC. Prodr. ix. 310). 
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