MR. G. MAW ON THE LIFE-HISTORY OF A CROCUS. 357 
The Perianth.—The throat is of special interest in relation to 
specifie character, as the presence or absence of the beard (a 
small bunch of transparent hairs at the base of the filament) is a 
good distinctive specific character, so invariably constant that 
Haworth employed it for grouping the genus into two distinct 
sections, which he termed Piligeri and Depilati ; but whilst it is 
of great use for individual specific distinction, it is of no help for 
natural grouping. 
The throat internally is almost always more orless orange; 
and in albinos, where the general flower-colouring is blotted out, 
the orange colour of the throat is still retained; even in the 
albinos of one or two orange species the orange of the throat is 
separately constant. The orange colour of the throat, though 
often showing through to the outside, is on the inner surface 
only, and it is nicely limited to where the fallen pollen-grains 
accumulate. These have a strong power of staining; and 1 
venture to suggest whether this golden zone of the throat may 
not be an inherited character from the mere mechanical tincture 
of the fallen orange pollen-grains, just as in many animals the 
bleaching and zonal eolouring of hair and feathers round the 
orifices of the body suggest to the eye a relation to the functions 
of which they are the channels. 
The perianth-segments vary from 3 inch to 23 inches in 
length ; the segments of the inner whorl are invariably somewhat 
Shorter than those of the outer. In Crocus iridiflorus the differ- 
ence is so much more striking than in any other species, that it 
suggested to Sehur its generie separation as Crociris. 
There appear to be two distinet sets of colour-cells in the 
segments, the colour of the inner surface never exactly corre- 
sponding with the outer; and by a little dextrous manipulation, 
the cells of the segments can be peeled off as three distinct 
layers, the central layer being almost colourless. 
Excepting the self-coloured species, the colouring of the outer 
Surface of the outer segments is notably different to that of the 
inner segments as well as to that of their inner surface. In 
the species with distinct feathered markings the feathering is 
limited to the outer segments, excepting in Crocus versicolor, in 
which the external feathering is nearly equally applied to all six 
segments. In all other species the inner whorl is either differ- 
ently feathered, or unfeathered with just an indication at the 
base of a few lines of incipient feathering. Although any well- 
