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CENTAUREA pulcra. 
Beautiful Blue Bottle. 
é 
SYNGENESIA POLYGAMIA. 
Nat. ord. CYNARACEÆ, seu COMPOSITE-CYNAREA, DC. 
CENTAUREA. L. 
Ser. III. CYANEA&. Squamarum involucri mediarum appendix plùs 
minis scariosa secus squamam decurrens, rariùs in spinam simplicem desinens. 
Sect. XV. Cyanus. Invelucri ovati aut subglobosi squame margine 
usque ad apicem serrato-membranaceo ciliato cinctæ. Cor. radii discum su- 
perantes. Stigmata libera. Pappus duplex, mediocris aut brevis. 
Capitula non bracteata. DC. prodr. vii. 578. 
C. pulcra; caule ramoso foliisque uniformiter albido-tomentosis, foliis lato- 
linearibus subsessilibus amplexicaulibusque basi rotundatis apice acutis 
integerrimis aut hinc inde denticulatis, fructus pappo duplici: ext. paleis . 
linearibus vix acutis regulariter imbricatis et successive longioribus 
acheenii longitudinem seguantibus, interiore pauciseto. DC. prodr. I. c. 
no. 66. paucis mutatis. 
The garden of the Horticultural Society owes this 
pretty annual to Dr. Hugh Falconer, superintendent of the 
Botanical Garden, Saharunpur; but whether or not it is a 
native of the North of India is not clear. According to 
DeCandolle it was found by Wight and Royle cultivated in 
gardens; but the latter author adds, in his “ Illustrations of 
the Botany of the Himalayan Mountains," that he had re- 
ceived it only from Cashmere, whence he supposes it to have 
been introduced into the gardens of the Indian peninsula. 
With us it is a beautiful hardy annual, in general appear- 
ance resembling the queen of our wild flowers, the Centaurea 
cyanus of corn-fields; but it is much more woolly, dwarfer, 
a good deal branched, with shorter radial florets, and the 
pappus of its fruit is long, discoloured, very unequal, and at 
least as long as the seed-vessel itself. In its manner of growth 
it bears more resemblance to C. depressa, of the Crimea and 
