84 SWISS FLOWERS. 



65. Cyclamen. 



(PLATE XXXVIL) 



The Cyclamen is now so much cultivated in pots, pro- 

 ducing such beautiful decorations for the early part of the 

 year, and is moreover so peculiar in its shape, that it is 

 well known as a florist's plant. But it is a new and very 

 great pleasure to find it growing so freely in the woods, 

 or up the mountain-side, as to make it possible to 

 gather a nosegay of its sweet-scented blossoms as easily 

 as a bunch of Primroses with us. All parts of the plant 

 are pretty — its flower, its pink stems, its variegated leaves. 



C. Europseum (Fig. 65) has five stamens ; its one petal, 

 after forming a kind of pentagonal ring at the mouth of 

 the tube, spreads into five divisions, which look like dis- 

 tinct petals, and which turn back upon the calyx, thus 

 giving the purplish-rose flower an appearance quite its 

 own. The leaves are roundish, heart-shaped at the base, 

 rather leathery, and toothed at the edge, prettily variegated 

 with white on the upper side, pink on the under. After 

 blossoming, the flower-stalks begin to turn spirally inwards, 

 so as at length to bury the seed in the earth. Woods of the 

 low mountains. 



C. hedersefolium, so called from the ivy-like shape of its 

 leaves, blossoms after the above. It has ten angles to its 



