PREFACE. WE are again brought to the closing portion of another volume of our MAGAZINE, and thus furnished with an appropriate occasion of traversing, shortly, the course we have pursued during the past year, and recording our thanks for the continued liberal encouragement which our friends have favoured us with. As heretofore, we have endeavoured to render this Magazine a source of floral pleasure and useful information, avoiding anything distasteful or unedifying, and aiming to meet the requirements of all our readers. It is gratifying to us to have to state, not a single complaint has been made during the year, but many flattering commendations, both of the subjects introduced, the selection of flowers figured, and the excellence of their execution, have been sent us. Ours was the first small Magazine containing coloured figures of new flowers, we determined it should be a cheap one, and within the reach of all persons, and as it was so it continues to be, supplying the greatest amount of useful floral information for the price charged; and so it shall be, whilst we have the support, literally and otherwise, of our friends, and this we respectfully solicit. We are aware that many persons well able to write on floral subjects, feel reluctant to do so, because they say it has to meet with public inspection, but if such individuals would write with all the simplicity and ease they converse with their friends, they would soon be favourably surprised at their own productions; we respectfully ask such to try, and we feel assured there will be little for an Editor to correct. We very sincerely tender our thanks to all our generous friends for the past, and with their continued assistance we reiterate the assurance, that no practicable means of rendering our publication additionally and enduringly useful shall be untried. THE Hydrophyllaceae. Pentandria Monogynia. HE Horticultural Society, in 1843, sent Mr. Hartweg to collect new plants in South America, and more particularly in Mexico and California. Some very interesting particulars of his researches are inserted in our last year's volume. The results of his industry were rewarded with the discovery of many of our handsomest annual flowers, an enumeration of which are given in the extracts above referred to, and to which we direct our reader's attention. In his remarks on an excursion to "the Butes," an isolated group of mountains in California, he states, "A ride of fifteen miles brought to the foot of the mountains. The lower range, as in the former visit higher up the valley, is occupied by a Leanothus, a few live oaks, and Pinus Sabiniana. Following a small rivulet, I found there a Mentha, and another labiate plant, Stenactis, a shrubby Labiate tinctoria. This new species of Collinsia is of stronger growth, though less striking, than C. bicolor; it grows chiefly on the dry sandy bed, or on the banks of the rivulet, and produces its yellowish flowers, mottled with purple, much later than C. bicolor. On a subsequent occasion, when I returned to this place to procure seeds of it, my hands were stained yellow by the glandular hairs which cover the seed pods, from which circumstance I named it Collinsia tinctoria. Another very interesting plant I found on this excursion (in May, 1844) is Nemophila speciosa, with white petals, one-third of which is tipped with violet-purple. It grows generally near rivulets, or in damp and partly shaded places. If the few seeds I procured should vegetate, it will prove a great acquisition to that handsome genus." Mr. Bentham considered that the specific title "speciosa," given by Mr. Hartweg, was not quite as appropriate as maculata; he rejected the former and adopted the latter. VOL. XVII. No. 25.-N.S. B |