As it should seem a determined principle in the inscrutable arrangement of nature’s productions, to the greater humiliation of our very limited understandings; that no effort as emanating solely from thence, shall be perfect; so must we be content to pursue our Botanical travel, under the guidance of a system decidedly defective; yet certainly, the best we have to boast. Scarce a genus, comprehending a number of species, but must be strained in its class or order, for the introduction of one, or more species, evidently of the same family. So convinced was our great master of the science, of the impossibility of forming such certain data, that to prevent the confusion and difficulty, which must have arisen, from such an accumulation of Genera, if every sexual character was attended to, that, where certain other characters (called by him essential, and adopted as a substitute for such occasional hiatus) are formed, the plant is retained under the Genus so characterised. This disquisition is the natural result of our examination of the present plant, which, although the chives are six, is placed in the fifth class! The Rough-leaved Cordia is a native of the Weft India Islands and was cultivated, says Martyn’s Dictionary, from Dillenius, in the year 1728, by Dr. Sherard. It is a tender hot-house plant, may be increased by cuttings made about the month of April, if kept from too much moisture, in a pot of sandy loam, under a small striking glass in the bark-bed. At present it is rather a scarce plant in our collections, and as it is rather difficult to propagate, is likely to continue so, at least for some years. From an imported plant, received by Messrs. Lee and Kennedy, Hammersmith, from the island of Barbadoes, our figure was taken in the year 1789, about the month of July. It is grown to the greatest perfection by keeping it in a mixture of rotten dung and loam. [Illustration] PLATE CLVIII. GERANIUM ECHINATUM. _Var. flore rubro-purpureo._ _Prickly-stalked Geranium. Red-purple flowered Var._ CLASS XVI. ORDER IV. _of Suppl. Syst. Veg. 1781._ _MONADELPHIA DECANDRIA._ Threads united. Ten Chives. ESSENTIAL GENERIC CHARACTER. MONOGYNA. Stigmata 5. Fructus rostratus, penta-coccus. ONE POINTAL. Five Summits. Fruit furnished with long awns, five dry berries. See GERANIUM GRANDIFLORUM. Pl. XII. Vol. I. SPECIFIC CHARACTER. Geranium foliis sericeis, cordatis, inequaliter dentatis; caule spinoso, subcarnoso, spinis retrofractis; floribus hexandris, rubro-purpureis; calycibus pilosis. Geranium with silky heart-shaped leaves, unequally toothed; stem spiny, rather fleshy, spines turned downwards; flowers with six fertile tips and red-purple; cups hairy. REFERENCE TO THE PLATE. 1. The Empalement. 2. An upper Petal of the Blossom. 3. An under Petal of the Blossom. 4. The Chives and Pointal. 5. The Chives spread open. 6. The Pointal, magnified.