Tas. 7237. 
ALTHAEA FicrFoLta. 
Native of S.H. Europe and the East. 
Nat. Ord. Matvacrm.—tTribe Matves. 
Genus Attuma, Linn.; (Benth, et Hook. f. Gen. Pl. vol. i. p. 200.) 
Auruza (Pterocarpe) ficifolia ; caule erecto simplici setis simplicibus stella- 
tisque saepius reflexis hispido in racemum laxiflorum abeunte, foliis ambitu 
orbicularibus profunde cordatis palmatim lobatis v. partitis viridibus 
supra pilosis subtus stellatim hispidulis, lobis 5-7 ovatis v. oblongis 
crenato-dentatis apicibus rotundatis, pedunculis calyce subeequilongis, 
involucri calyce fere duplo brevioris lobis triangularibus, calycis lobis 
triangularibus acutis, corolla ampla pallide flava, carpellis dorso cana- 
liculatis rugosis marginatis v. auguste alatis hirsutis, facie glabris v. 
hirtis. 
A. ficifolia, Cav. Diss. vol. ii. p. 92, t. 28, f. 2; DC. Prodr. vol. i. p. 437; M. Bieb. 
Fl. Taur. Cauc. vol. ii. p. 142; Ledeb. Fl. Alt. vol. iii. p. 286; Fl. Ross. 
vol. i. p. 433. 
A. rugosa, Alef. in Oestr. Bot. Wochen. 1862, p. 254. 
A. Froloviana, Fisch. ew Ledeb. Fl. Ross. vol. i. p. 433. 
Aucea ficifolia, Linn. Sp. Pl. p. 687; Schkuhr Handb. t. 191; Lamk. Illustr. 
¢.191; Boiss. Fl. Orient. vol. i. p. 833 ; Besser Enwm, p. 28. 
A very handsome Hollyhock, long known in cultivation, 
if, as is supposed, it is the Malva arborea of the Herbarium 
Blackwellianum, vol. i. t. 54, which, though agreeing in 
foliage and calyx, &c., has bright rose-coloured flowers. 
Boissier, in the Flora Orientalis, cites Linnzeus’s Hortus 
Cliffortianus, p. 348, as the authority for Alcea ficifolia, 
on the authority of Linnzus himself in the first edition of 
the Species Plantarum (p. 687); but it appears to me to 
be impossible to say what the Alcea foliis palmatis of Hort. 
Cliff. is, for Linneus cites as a synonym Malva rosea foliis 
ficus of Bauhin’s Pinax, p. 313, and adds that it is hardly 
distinct from A. rosea, the common Hollyhock of our 
rdens. The only difference between Althaea rosea and 
A. ficifolia is, the usually narrow lobing of the leaves of the 
latter, and this is so variable a character that though I have 
seen no specimens of the rose-flowered Hollyhock with the 
June Ist, 1892. 
