here figured as var. grandiflora, in which the flowers are 
white and the corollas are much larger than in typical 
V. Blattaria, Linn., seems to be of doubtful origin. 
For the seeds from which the subject of our plate was 
raised Kew is indebted to the Director of the John 
Innes Horticultual Institution, Merton, and the original 
parent plant it is understood came from Lincolnshire, 
where it was found growing in a corn-field. At Kew it 
calls for no special treatment. The seeds were sown in 
1918 and the plants flowered in 1919, those under green- 
house conditions in May, those in a border outside 
somewhat later, in both cases ripening seeds freely. 
Notwithstanding the striking appearance of this new 
variety, it differs from typical V. Blattaria mainly in the 
extreme luxuriance of all its parts. 
Description.—Herb, biennial ; stem 14-2 ft. high, with 2-3 branches towards 
the top, glabrous downwards, slightly and finely glandular high up. Leaves 
of the rosette linear-lanceolate, acute, narrowed to the petiole, 8 in. long, 
1} in. wide, deeply sinuately lobed, the lobes dentate, glabrous on both 
surfaces, midrib and nerves impressed above, raised beneath; of the stem 
shorter, ovate-lanceolate or ovate, somewhat decurrent at the base. Inflor- 
escence terminal ; flowers solitary in the bract-axils ; bracts ovate-lanceolate, 
i near the middle over 1 in. long, about 3 in. wide, the lower 
rasner , arger, the upper rather smaller, slightly glandular on both surfaces ; 
tf a tang % in. long, glandular. Calyx somewhat irregularly divided 
nae e base into 5 lanceolate, acute, glandular segments, the one 
wide Corolla, rather smaller than the remaining, which are 2 in. long, } in. 
- i le grag slightly zygomorphic, 14 in. across, cream-coloured with 
ae. fhe e lobes next the axis with clavate purple hairs, elsewhere 
. “i — te) . 5, suborbicular, 2 in. long, 3 in. wide, the ones next the 
o ay eae ri Stamens usually 5, filaments beset with purple. clavate 
sli htl a ss q e axis } in. long, the lateral about } in. long, the anterior 
pie aad ro upwards, and } in. long. Ovary ovoid-sphaeroid, } in. long 
much across, densely glandular-papillose, pale green; style nearly } in. 
long, covered wi : 1 le ne : 
green, weet Co hairs below, purple; stigma cylindric, entire, 
Tas. 8863.—Fig. 1, caly sai : ' 
shes - 4, calyx and pistil ; 2, base of corolla, showing the staminal 
insertion ; 8, 4 and 5, stamens; 6, glandular hair from filament; 7, ovary ; 
nae ig of upper portion of stem :—all enlarged except 8, which is much 
