This is the only species of the Genus we have yet seen from the Cape of Good Hope; and, as it appears that Thunberg discovered but this solitary instance, which he has given in his Prodromus Plantarum Capensium, under the specific title we have here adopted, from him; he, perhaps, thought himself warranted in so naming it; although naming plants from the country where they are first found requires but little reasoning to shew its impropriety. It is a hardy green-house plant, but from all appearance, like the most of this natural order, rather short-lived. It grows freely in a mixture of loam and sandy peat; and there is every appearance that the seeds will ripen, the only method by which there is any likelihood of its being perpetuated. The plant, before flowering, does not grow above six inches high; but the flower-stem rises near eighteen inches. Our figure was taken from a plant in the Hibbertian Collection; where it flowered for the first time in England in the month of July 1803; having been sent home, by Mr. Niven, from the Cape, in 1800. [Illustration] PLATE CCCXXXVII. PROTEA TRITERNATA. _Cluster-headed Protea._ CLASS IV. ORDER I. _TETRANDRIA MONOGYNIA._ Four Chives. One Pointal. ESSENTIAL GENERIC CHARACTER. COROLLA quadrifida seu quadripetala. Antheræ lineares, insertæ petalis infra apicem. Calyx proprius nullus. SEMINA solitaria. BLOSSOM four-cleft or four petals. Tips linear, inserted into the petals below the point. Empalement proper, none. SEEDS solitary. See PROTEA FORMOSA, Pl. XVII. Vol. I. SPECIFIC CHARACTER. Protea foliis bipinnatis, brevibus, filiformibus, confertis, glabris; floribus terminalibus, umbellatis; pedunculis bracteis, capitulis longioribus; squamis calycinis subulatis, hirtis. Protea with doubly winged leaves, short, thread-shaped, crowded and smooth; flowers terminate the branches in umbels; fruit stalks with floral leaves, and longer than the small heads; scales of the cup awl-shaped and hairy. REFERENCE TO THE PLATE. 1. A Leaf. 2. A Flower. 3. One of the Petals of the flower, magnified. 4. The Seed bud, Shaft and Summit, the Summit detached, magnified. 5. The common Cup of one of the small heads of flowers.