Valeriana tripteris, montana, and rotundijblia of Villars 



are very nearly allied. The cauline leaves of the first being, 

 according to the just-named author, sometimes quite entire, 

 it is not easily distinguished from montana, except by the 

 more glaucous colour of the leaves. 



Our present plant, which Ave take to be the rotundijblia 

 of Villars, is the smallest of the three, scarcely exceeding 

 the height of eight or ten inches. It seems to vary with 

 leaves, sometimes quite entire and sometimes slightly toothed. 



Haller, in his Opuscula, above quoted, has sought out 

 the synonymy with great labour, and reduces what had been 

 considered by Caspar Bauhin and the Botanists of his time, 

 as several species, to one and the same ; Villars, from his 

 own observations, thinks it right to separate our plant from 

 the scrophularicofolia of Bauhin's Prodromus, in which he 

 does not seem to have been followed by any more modern 

 author. On this account we have considered the two as 

 varieties only ; which Villars himself acknowledges they may 

 be, though he at the same time asserts that he had frequently 

 found it difficult to distinguish the varieties of tripteris and 

 montana from one another^ but that he was never in danger 

 of confounding the rotundijblia with any of the varieties of 

 the other two. 



A hardy perennial. Native of the mountainous regions of 

 the South of Europe. Flowers in May and June. Com- 

 municated by Mr. Pringle, of the Sydenham Nursery. 



