Tas. 6910. 
GERANIUM voserosum, var. Cmarnestt. 
Native of Affghanistan. 
Nat. Ord. GERaNIACER.—Tribe GERANIER. 
Genus Geranium, Linn.; (Benth, et Hook. f. Gen. Pl. vol. i. p. 272.) 
Geranium tuberosum; plus minus pubescens vy. hirsutum, rhizomate tuberoso, 
caulibus erectis superne pluries et divaricatim 2-3-chotomis, foliis ambitu 
suborbiculatis 5-9-partitis, segmentis lanceolatis, radicalibus longe petiolatis, 
floralibus sessilibus, pedunculis 1—-2-floris fructiferis erectis, sepalis hirtis ovatis 
abrupte mucronatis, petalis obcordatis calyce duplo longioribus, valvulis hirtis. 
G. tuberosum, Linn ;— Boiss. Fl. Orient. vol. i. p. 873. 
Var. Charlesii, Aitchison and Hemsley mss.; rhizomatibus superpositis, foliorum 
segmentis integrioribus. 
This is one of the difficult cases that often present them- 
selves to a systematist, of determining whether a divergent 
form of a species obtained from the extreme limits of 
the geographical area of that species should be entitled to 
specific rank. The subject of the present plate is from 
Affghanistan ; and the type of Geranium to which it belongs 
(G. tuberosum) extends from the Mediterranean region and 
North Africa to Persia, but had not hitherto been found 
_ anywhere to the eastward of that region; and here we have - 
from beyond its known limits a plant differing from tuberosum 
only in the less laterally lobed segments of the leaf, and its 
superposed rhizomes. In such a case as this the variability 
of the type must be taken into account ; and as Boissier, 
who knew Gt. tuberosum better than any one, says of it that 
it is very variable as to foliage, the conclusion adopted by 
Aitchison and Hemsley is no doubt the right one. A more 
remarkable character than the foliage is the superposed 
subterranean rhizomes, as shown in our plate and in all Dr. 
-Aitchison’s specimens; in the type plant they seem to be 
_ almost invariably solitary. 
Var. Charlesii was raised from tubers sent to Kew by 
Dr. Aitchison when on the Affghan Boundary Commission, 
DEC. lst, 1886. 
