Porlieria
(named after Andrew de Porlier, a Spanish patron of botany.) ORD. Zygophylleae. A small genus (three species) of rigid, stove shrubs, with spreading, woody branches, natives of Texas, Mexico, the Peruvian Andes, Chili, and Parana. Flowers disposed in fasciculate, one-flowered peduncles; sepals four or five, rotundate, unequal, deciduous; petals four or five, unguiculate, imbricated. Leaves opposite, abruptly pinnate; leaflets almost opposite, entire, sensitive. The under-mentioned species (the only one introduced) thrives in a mixture of loam and peat. Propagation may be effected by ripened cuttings, inserted thinly in a pot of sand, and placed under a hand glass, in moderate head.
P. hygrometrica (hygrometric). fl. green, white; calyx deeply four-parted; petals four, connivent. April. l. with seven or eight pairs of linear leaflets; these remain spread open during fair weather, but contract on the approach of rain. h. 2ft. Peru, 1820.