Volume 10 — PLATE DCXLVI. PROTEA RADIATA. Radiated Protea.

CLASS IV. ORDER I.

TETRANDRIA MONOGYNIA. Four Chives. One Pointal.

ESSENTIAL GENERIC CHARACTER.

Corolla 4-fida seu 4-petala. Antheræ lineares, petalis infra apices insertæ. Calyx proprius nullus. Semina solitaria.

Blossom four-cleft, or of four petals. Tips linear, inserted into the petals below the points. Cup proper none. Seeds solitary.

SPECIFIC CHARACTER.

Protea foliis obtuse lanceolatis, obliquis, horizontaliter sitis: squamis calycinis spathulatis, rubris, tomentosis, marginibus pilosis: caule erecto, bipedali.

Protea with leaves obtusely lance-shaped, standing sideways in an horizontal direction: scales of the empalement spathula-shaped, red, and downy, with hairy margins. Stem upright, and about two feet high.

REFERENCE TO THE PLATE.

This Protea is nearest allied to the P. coronata published in the Seventh Volume of this Work, Pl. 469, but differs essentially from it (and also from every other species of Protea at present known to us) in having so few flowers, that the centre looks like an empty cup, the flowers being spread out towards the imbricated scales of the empalement in a circular manner; whence its specific title of radiata. In the bud state it does not promise that splendid appearance which it exhibits when expanded. Our figure represents a plant from the nursery of Mr. Knight, of the King’s Road, Chelsea. At the base we have added the head of flowers of a green variety, communicated to us from the Hammersmith Nursery, raised from Cape seed, at the same time as the red, about the year 1809, and which flowered for the first time in this country last autumn (1811).

In our last Number we forgot to mention that the figure of the Lobelia Speculum was taken from a plant in the nursery of Messrs. Colville, and the Epidendrum fragrans from the collection of J. Vere, esq.