James Edward Smith

“ Nothing can be more distinct as a species; but it was not well ascertained when Dr. Sibthorp began his travels, which will account for his adverting to the American Liquidambar only.
There still remains great difficulty in accounting for the introduction of this tree into Cyprus, and for its becoming so famous there. The plant is not known to have been cultivated in England, much before the end of the seventeenth century, scarcely fifty years before Pococke found it, apparently long established in Cyprus. The Venetians were owners of this island from the year 1480 to 1570 ”

“ The inflorescence is a dense obtuse cluster, one inch and a half long, interrupted in the lower part. The bracteas however afford a clear specific difference, being lanceolate, and extending not only to the summit of the short and thick partial flower-stalks, but often reaching much beyond the calyx, which latter is very broad and shallow, unequally three-cleft, sometimes with a few supernumerary teeth or notches. The petals are very different in shape from both the preceding species, being lanceolate and acute. Their colour seems a greenish white. ”

“ Narthecium, which agrees most in habit with the genus before us, is distinguished from it by the want of a calyx; as well as by having a simple germen and single style; hairy filaments; and a membranous tunic, tapering at each end, to the seeds. Anthericum, including the Phalangium of Tournefort and Jussieu, differs from Tofieldia in having no calyx; a simple germen and style; and angular seeds. Helonias, to which Willdenow refers our T. palustris, confounding under that solitary species nearly the whole genus, has a simple germen and capsule, though three styles; very few seeds in each cell ”

“ At length however it becomes necessary that this obscure genus should assume as regular a form as possible in the Flora Britannica; where, as in every other instance, my object is to publish nothing that I have not ascertained myself, at least as far as the imperfection of all human knowledge and judgment will permit. ”

“ THE genus of Pæderota was first constituted by Linnæus in his Academical Dissertation entitled Plantæ rariores Africanæ, published at Upsal in 1760, and reprinted in the 6th volume of the Amænitates Academicæ in 1763. In the former edition the genus was called Hemimeris, in the latter Pæderota, and the only species there mentioned bears the trivial name of bonæ spei. This plant has never been well known to botanists in general. ”

“ How the Liquidambar Styraciflua travelled to Cyprus, must therefore remain unexplained; for we have not even a legend to help us, like that of the staff of Joseph of Arimathea at Glastonbury. That so great a novelty should have acquired considerable reputation in the garden of a Cyprian convent, so as to have even supernatural properties attributed to it, may not so much excite our wonder. Its celebrity indeed appears to have declined between the periods of Dr. Pococke's visit and Dr. Sibthorp's, but the tree itself still flourished. Dr. Sibthorp, like his predecessor, found it forming seed ”

“ The umbels are solitary, axillary, and simple. Flowers scarcely one-third of the zize of the robusta, and their covers are neither broader than the calyx, nor longer; neither are they contracted in their middle. ”

“ We found the fruit then ripe, and exhibiting a most magnificent spectacle. The plant was much larger than any I had seen of the same species, and seems to be one of the oldest in England. We learn from the Hortus Kewensis that this Cycas has been about 40 years in our collections. It is not known that the Farnham plant was larger at its first introduction than such as are usually brought from abroad, perhaps 2 or 3 feet in the diameter of the circle formed by the expanded leaves; that diameter is now 10 or 12 feet. ”

“ When wounded, these fronds distilled distilled a great quantity of thick clear insipid mucilage, which soon hardened into a substance resembling gum tragacanth, in which probably resides the nutritive quality for which this Palm is so celebrated in the Flora Japonica. We are there told that a very small morsel of the pith of its stem is sufficient to sustain life a long time, and on that account the plant is jealously preferved for the use of the Japanese army. ”

“ In T. officinale the radiant or dilated part of the marginal flowers consists of two neighbouring petals, each of which has one large, and one very small, lobe; in T. apulum there is only one radiant petal to each flower, whose two very large lobes are equal. ”

“ This species is, in every part, twice the size of the foregoing, of which it has, till now, been considered as a variety, whose greater luxuriance, or more dilated habit, was attributed to its situation in a more favourable climate. Into this error I have been led in the Flora Britannica, where therefore a number of erroneous synonyms are accumulated; but the description belongs precisely to the T. palustris, except perhaps what regards the bracteas and fruit. ”

“ We can only retain the genus as an artificial one, along with many other such, till the science be arrived at a greater degree of perfection; keeping, the mean time, naturaI orders in view as the grand object of our systematic inquiries, and cherishing every truly natural genus as a fixed point, on which we may found the principles of future discoveries. ”

“ But to learn and to teach are very different things. I cannot too often protest against those more tempting roads to immortality, gratuitous changes of names, and speculations in classification. The former can only be permitted, if at all, to the most eminent leaders and reformers of botanical science, who may be capable of acquiring supreme authority in the latter. ”

“ This was probably the same tree that Pococke had seen. To ascertain the Lignum Rhodium has been much wished by the naturalists. An American tree, growing in the swamps of Virginia, seems to have little claim to be considered as the tree which should produce it. The name of Xylon Effendi, and the traditions of the convent, testify the reputation in which this tree has long been held in the island. It was probably originally introduced by the Venetians during their possession of Cyprus. ”

“ With respect to the two species of Hemimeris in question, they perfectly accord with the generic character given above, with which also the Linnæan fabulosa and diffusa, (which I have carefully macerated and dissected) , and to all appearance the montana also, perfectly agree. In their general habit and structure they also manifestly form altogether one natural genus. ”

“ Its seeds indeed bear some resemblance to those of a Conium; and the flowers, which the able author just cited never saw, are uniform, scarcely radiant. The habit and foliage agree with Conium rather than with Tordylium. But, on the other hand, the character of the involucella dimidiata is not observable, and the crisped margin of the seeds answers better to Tordylium, though their strongly 3-ribbed disk is adverse, and rather belongs to Conium. To the latter genus I should perhaps consent to remove this species. Professor Sprengel, in his Prodr. Plant. ”

“ This the Greeks call Xylon Effendi. The Eugumenos of the convent, a very old man, offered himself as my conductor; and leading me a few paces below the convent, into a garden, now covered with rubbish, he pointed out a tree, which upon examination I found to be Liquidambar Styraciflua. ”

“ It is more akin to our second and third species, with which it accords in general aspect, but the roots are of a more creeping nature, and the stem is taller, a foot or more in height, quite leafless, except at the very base, cylindrical throughout, glaucous in the upper part. Leaves narrow, near three inches long, with a small oblique point; their edges rough toward the extremity. Cluster erect, many-flowered, from two to four inches in length, rather lax, but scarcely interrupted. ”

“ Leaves rather few, all radical, except one or two on the very lowest part of the stem, which do not rise above the others; they are all erect, four or five inches long, narrow, ribbed, bright green, smooth, except a slight roughness towards the point. Cluster scarcely an inch in length, ovate, obtuse, of twelve or fourteen flowers, on hairy stalks, sometimes in pairs, hardly a quarter of an inch long, erect or slightly spreading, having at the base one or two membranous acute bracteas, one-third their own length. Calyx not deeply lobed. Petals yellowish, obovate, about as long as the stalks. ”

“ Mrs. Hardcastle of Derby, to whom I am indebted for the drawings now laid before the Linnæan Society, regrets that she only heard of this curious vegetable production by accident, after it had lain by ten months in a dry state. ”

“ Tofieldia stenopetala. ⁠ T. glutionsa.
three-cleft. Petals rather more yellowish, scarcely so long as the stamens. They are represented too narrow and acute in M. Redouté's figure. Capsules combined almost all the way up, making together a roundish-elliptical three-lobed figure, larger than a coriander seed, of a light brown, transversely corrugated, their points widely spreading, crowned with the short thick styles, and capitate stigmas. The seeds are extremely numerous. ”

“ A single specimen of this new species oi Leptospermum, gathered by Dr. White in New South Wales, has been communicated to me by A. B. Lambert, Esq. It is much larger than any other I have seen of the genus, especially the leaves, which are above an inch long, and near a quarter of an inch broad. Their form is lanceolate, tapering more towards the base than towards the extremity, and they are tipped with a small prominent, sharp point ”

“ But as it is, enough may be discerned for our purpose; and the form of the leaves, the length of the partial involucrum, and the figure of the seed, all agree with T. officinale, not with apulum.
To the latter belong the synonyms of Rivin. Pentap. Irr. t. 2, and Jacq. Hart. Vind. v. 1. 21. t. 53; which last is quoted in MSS. by Linnæus in his own copy of Sp. PI. This is likewise T. apulum of Prodr. Fl. Græc. n. 631, from which however must be removed the reference to Columna, and consequently the synonym of Tournefort depending thereon; Jacq. Hort. v. 1. t. ”

“ XXX. exhibits one of the fronds of its full size. Fig. I. is an abortive drupa; 2. a ripe one; 3. a drupa cut longitudinally; 4. all the integuments of the fruit; 5. albumen; 6. cavity deftined to contain the embryo. ”

“ Such was doubtless the plant of the Hortus Cliffortianus, which appears by the Viridarium Cliffortianum to have been cultivated at Hartecamp, and was therefore seen alive by Linnæus. Such likewise is T. apulum of Jacquin, Hort. Vindob. v. 1. t. 53, which that author afterwards finding not to answer to the synonym of Columna, he thought he had mistaken the Linnæan name, and in the 3d volume of the same work, p. ”