Lathyrus pubescens has rather a wide distribution in 

 extra-tropical South America, from Valparaiso to Chiloe in 

 Chili, and from Monte Video to Banda Oriental and Parana 

 in the east. Mr. Andre, who was the first to cultivate it in 

 Europe, in his garden at La Croix, in Touraine, from 

 seeds sent by Mr. Cantana from Uruguay, describes it as 

 forming festoons of glaucescent leaves and lilac flowers 

 covering the branches of shrubs three to five feet high. 

 C. Gay, in his " Flora of Chili," described the corolla as 

 yellow (aurea), but this must be an oversight. 



The specimen here figured was from a plant presented 

 in 1900 to the Royal Gardens, Kew, by W. Gumbleton, 

 Esq., of Belgrove, Queenstown, which flowered in a cool 

 house in April, 1902. 



Descr. — A softly hairy, diffusely branching shrub. Stem 

 and branches and peduncles four-angled, the angles form- 

 ing stout ribs. Leaves with one, rarely two pairs of 

 leaflets ; petiole produced into a stout, trifid tendril ; 

 leaflets sessile, one to two and a half inches long, elliptic, 

 oblong, or oblong-lanceolate, acute, dark green, strongly 

 ribbed beneath ; stipules semisagittate, very variable in 

 size and breadth. Peduncle long or short, stout, stiff, 

 hearing a short, lax- or dense-flowered raceme of large, 

 shortly pedicelled flowers, variable in size, sometimes an 

 inch and a quarter broad. Calyx-tube broadly campa- 

 nulate, five-toothed; two upper teeth short, deltoid, 

 three lower much longer, narrowed into subulate points. 

 Standard orbicular, notched at the tip, violet-blue, margins 

 recurved. Wing-petals broad, spreading, pale lilac dorsally, 

 nearly white in front. Keel much smaller, petals falcately 

 curved, white, with red tips. Pod two to two and a half 

 inches long, linear, about one-third of an inch broad ; 

 acute; valves hairy, flat. Seeds very small, ellipsoid. — 

 —J. D. H. 



Fig. 1, calyx laid open and stamens; 2, keel petal; 3 and 4, anthers; 

 5, pistil; 6, legumes ; 7 and 8, aeeds :— all enlarged, except figs. 6 and 7. 



