Mantissas of the same work various synonyms are added 
from Bieberstein and others, from which it is to be inferred 
that it is a Caucasian plant; but it is probable that all 
those synonyms are spurious, and consequently they throw 
no light upon its origin. 
By degrees, however, a suspicion arose that Crocus pu- 
sillus, a plant originally described by Tenore in his Flora 
Napolitana, but with incorrect synonyms, might be the same 
as C. biflorus, and Reichenbach even refers the new species 
of Tenore to the latter. Specimens, for which 1 am indebted 
to the Hon. W. F. Strangways, to a great extent confirm the 
correctness of the modern Opinion, and render it extremely 
probable that our garden Scotch Crocus is a native of the 
southern parts of Italy ; and owes its peculiar appearance to 
long years of domestication. 
It is this very pretty wild plant that the accompanying 
plate is intended to illustrate. The colours are more strongly 
marked here than in the Scotch Crocus, and the peculiar 
striation of the sepals of that plant is hardly traceable ; all 
the parts moreover are smaller, and the anthers are shorter 
than the stigmas, instead of equalling them in length. But 
the peculiar dull, dirty yellow of the sepals, the texture of 
the tunics of the cormi, and especially the form and undi- 
vided structure of the stigmas, on which I am disposed to 
put much reliance, are all characters ‘of correspondence 
between these two, and, I think, afford reasonable evidence 
of their identity. Nevertheless, I have not absolutely com- 
bined them, but figure this plant as I find it, leaving it to 
those who agrge with me in opinion, to add the synonyms of 
C. biflorus should they think proper. 
According to Tenore, C. pusillus inhabits sterile sub- 
mountainous pastures of the valleys of S. Rocco and of Orso- 
lonenear Naples, about M ontescaglioso, Potenza and elsewhere 
in Lucania. Gussone finds it near Caronia, Mistretta, S. 
Fratello, Montalbano and Floresta in Sicily; and Reichen- 
bach says that it occurs on sterile hills near Parma, and in 
the Roman states. 
Fig. 1. is an expanded flower; 2. shews the stamens 
and stigmas. 
