5. The seed-bud and pointal, with the summit detached and magnified. In the last volume of Willdenow’s Species Plantarum, containing the great class Syngenesia, are found many valuable botanical alterations and amendments, respecting the division and distribution of the genera and species; and amongst others, we find the Linnæan genus Xeranthemum, and even its species the annuum, with its supposed variety the inapertum, divided and arranged exactly after the manner proposed in our account of X. bracteatum (Plate 375), now Elychrisum bracteatum: those few species only being now called Xeranthema which have a squamous receptacle: viz. the annuum, and inapertum, of European origin; and the orientale, a native of Armenia. The plant here depicted was drawn from a living specimen in the Clapham collection, last December, where at first it only threw up one flower-stalk; but it has since become stronger, and shows a peduncle from the end of almost every branch. Although this species comes nearer Elychrisum in its generic characters than to any other genus, Gnaphalium not excepted, yet still we cannot help remarking, how much it recedes from the external appearance of most of its congeners, in being quite destitute of radiating scales. It is a green-house plant, a native of the Cape, and is propagated by cuttings; but is not at present in any collection we are acquainted with, except Mr. Hibbert’s. [Illustration] PLATE CCCCXXIX. PROTEA INCURVA. _Incurved-leaved Protea._ CLASS IV. ORDER I. _TETRANDRIA MONOGYNIA._ Four Chives. One Pointal. ESSENTIAL GENERIC CHARACTER. COROLLA quadrifida, sive quadripetala. Antheræ lineares, insertæ petalis infra apicem. Calyx proprius, nullus. Nux unisperma, supera. BLOSSOM four-cleft, or four-petaled. Tips linear, inserted on the petals below the apex. Empalement proper, none. Nut one-seeded, above. SPECIFIC CHARACTER, &c. PROTEA, foliis filiformibus incurvis glabris, capitulis racemoso-spicatis tomentosis. _Thunb. Prod. 26.--Diss. no. 22. tab. 3. fig. 2.--Willd. Sp. Pl. 1. 516._ PROTEA, with thread-shaped incurved smooth leaves, and heads of flowers racemose-spiked and woolly. REFERENCE TO THE PLATE. 1. A flower. 2. A petal magnified. 3. The seed-bud and pointal, with the summit detached and magnified. The Protea incurva is a native of the Cape of Good Hope, which is also the native country of by far the greater part of this extensive genus. In this country it is considered and treated as a hardy green-house plant; and requires, like most of its congeners, a fresh loamy soil, and an airy situation in the winter. A very abundant supply of fresh air, indeed, is of essential consequence in the cultivation of most of the Cape plants; they benefit by it in the day time in most sorts of weather, even if rainy, provided the plants are not wetted by the rain, and the temperature of the atmosphere is not lower than forty degrees of Fahrenheit’s thermometer.