PLATE 86. ALOE VARIEGATA. _Cape Province._ LILIACEAE. Tribe ALOINEAE. ALOE, _Linn._; _Benth. et Hook. f. Gen. Plant._ vol. iii. p. 776. =Aloe variegata=, _Linn. Sp. Pl._ vol. i. p. 321; _Fl. Cap._ vol. vi. p. 328. The _Aloe_ here represented differs from any we have previously illustrated by having the leaves arranged in three ranks which may become spirally twisted. In the “Flora Capensis” this character is used to distinguish a sub-genus “Gonialoe” which contains only the species _A. variegata_. The species is one of the oldest and most common aloes in cultivation. A coloured illustration appeared in the _Botanical Magazine_ (t. 513) in 1801, and it is recorded that a Mr. Fairchild had the species growing in England in 1720. For some reason the plant is not well represented in European herbaria, as even in 1897, when the genus was published in the “Flora Capensis,” the precise localities in which the species occurs in South Africa remained doubtful. The traveller and botanist, Carl Thunberg, collected the plant about 1772, and according to Mr. N. E. Brown it is represented in the Thunberg herbarium by “two leaves with the variegation on them well preserved, and a single flower.” The species is easy of cultivation and is propagated by means of suckers which send up small plants. From the plant in cultivation at Pretoria, four offshoots have developed in one season. We are enabled to figure this plant through the courtesy of Mrs. E. Rood, of Van Rhynsdorp, who forwarded us the living plant, which flowered at Pretoria in July 1922. Specimens are preserved in the National Herbarium, Pretoria (No. 2575). DESCRIPTION:--An acaulescent plant. _Leaves_ in three rows sometimes slightly spirally twisted, with irregular greenish-white bands on a dark green background; the lower leaves 8-10 cm. long, about 3·5 cm. broad, ovate, mucronate, almost flat above, keeled beneath, rough with small tubercles on the keel and margins; the inner leaves 14-23 cm. long, ovate-lanceolate, mucronate, concave on the inner face, keeled beneath, rough with small tubercles on the keel and margins. _Inflorescence_ from the axil of one of the lower leaves; peduncle 40 cm. long, 9 mm. in diameter, terete, with about 8 barren bracts below the flowers which occupy the uppermost 11 cm. of the peduncle. _Flowers_ at first erect, then horizontal, then pendulous when mature. _Bracts_ 1·2 cm. long, 6 mm. broad, long-acuminate, acute, longer than the pedicels, white, with a greenish-brown keel. _Pedicels_ 5 mm. long, terete, glabrous. _Perianth-tube_ 4 cm. long, 9 mm. in diameter, tubular, slightly ventricose and oblique at the base; lobes 9 mm. long, 5 mm. broad, obovate. _Stamens_ attached to the base of the perianth; filaments 4·5 cm. long, terete; anthers 2·5 mm. long, oblong. _Ovary_ 6 mm. long, 3 mm. in diameter, ellipsoid; style 4 cm. long, terete; stigma minutely 3-lobed.