Addisonia 15 



(Plate 88) 



fflBISCUS OCULIROSEUS 

 Crimson-eye Rose Mallow 



Native of the eastern United States, especially New Jersey 

 Family Mai,vaceas Mallow Family 



Hibiscus oculiroseus Britton, Jour. N. Y. Bot. Gard. 4: 220. 1903. 



A perennial herb usually five or six feet tall, with numerous cane- 

 like stems. The leaves are ovate or ovate-lanceolate, obtuse or 

 slightly cordate at the base, acuminate at the apex, palmately veined, 

 dentate or slightly crenate, densely but finely white stellate-pubes- 

 cent beneath, and green and slightly pubescent above. The blades 

 of the largest leaves attain as much as seven inches in length and are 

 somewhat three-lobed. The flowers are conspicuous, often with a 

 spread of six inches, and clustered on branches arising from several 

 of the upper nodes of the several main stems. The petioles and 

 peduncles are often adnate to each other. The corolla-lobes are pale 

 sea-foam yellow, almost white, with an eye of a Tyrian rose fcolor 

 which is a rather intense shade of red. The caly^-lobes are triangu- 

 lar-lanceolate; the bractlets are linear, shorter than the calyx and 

 somewhat spreading. The stamens are of unequal length, those near 

 the base of the column being shorter than those above. The pollen 

 is white with a faint suggestion of sea-foam yeUow. The style- 

 branches are spreading, but not strongly recurving, and only slightly 

 expanding into stigmatic surfaces. The mature capsule is ovoid- 

 conic, long-pointed, and five-valved. The seeds are reniform and 

 glabrous. 



Two living plants of this species were obtained at Absecon, New 

 Jersey, by William F. Bassett, a murseryman of Hammonton, New 

 Jersey, about the year 1880. In Mr. Bassett's words, ' 'a great many 

 thousands" of plants descended from these two plants were raised 

 from seed and sold to the trade under the popular name of "crimson- 

 eyed mallow," with the designation of Hibiscus Moscheutos var. 

 albus. A single plant from this source was obtained by the New 

 York Botanical Garden in the year 1896. In 1903, Dr. N. L. Britton 

 recognized several striking diagnostic characters and gave it the spe- 

 cific rank noted above. 



Pedigreed cultures have been grown at the New York Botanical 

 Garden for several generations of descent from the type plant. 

 Some lines of descent have bred remarkably true; others have shown 

 a tendency to vary, giving decreased intensity of color in the eye area 

 and developing diffuse pale pink colors in the blades. 



