RAFFLESIA, a remarkable genus of plants belonging to the small natural order ra,Psiacea, an order composed entirely of parasitic plants, which consist merely of a flower, and form part of the Tit/a/gen-3 (q.v.) of Lindley. The rajleeictcece are natives partly of the Indian islands and partly of South America. The plants of the genus raglesia have neither stalk nor leaves, but are mere flowers seated upon the roots of species of cissits, making their appearance at first as a hemispherical swelling of the bark of the root, and, after the bark has broken, rising up in the form Oa head of cabbage, whilst the perianth is covered with imbricated bractex, which are more or less recurved after it has opened. The perianth is thick, fleshy, and 5-partite. The germen is inferior, and contains many ovules; and the anthers, which are numerous, are seated under the revolute, margin of the top of the style column. After the flower has expanded, it
diffuses a carrion-like smell, that even attracts flies, and induces them to deposit their eggs. The largest and first-discovered species, R. Arnoldi, was discovered in 1818 in Sumatra by Dr. Arnold, and was sent to the eminent botanist, Robert Brown, by-sir Thomas Stamford Raffles, the British governor in Sumatra. Its flower measures fully 3 ft. in diameter, is capable of containing almost two gallons of fluid, sometimes weighs 10 lbs., and is the largest of all known flowers. A smaller species, R. patina, whose flowers are 16 in. to 2 ft. in diameter, is highly prized by the Javanese as a medicine, for its strong styptic powers. R. liorsfieldii, another Javanese species, is still smaller, its flowers being only 3 in. broad.