POTENTILLA. 



P. gracilis, though fine in the 6-inch stem and golden in the star, 

 establishes no special claim upon our place or purse. 



P. grammopetala is an Italian, of nearly a foot high, with white- 

 pet ailed but not very effective blossoms. 



P. grand! flora may often be seen in the hot alpine turf of the high 

 pastures. It may always be told at a glance from all forms of P. 

 aurea and P. alpestris, in that all the leaves are lobed in threes not in 

 fives, the three lobes being broad and oval and coarsely sharp-toothed, 

 soft and hairy and lax, until they are like those of some small bright- 

 green Strawberry, instead of having the stiffer alchemilloid look of the 

 others. The stems are bare and hairy and erect, about 6 inches or a 

 foot high, branching into sprays of large flowers of brilliant golden 

 yellow. 



P. Haynaldiana comes quite dose to P. valderia, but has its leaves 

 narrower and smooth on the upper surface, though forming into the 

 same heavy foliose masses, from which rise the same tall, leafy , branching, 

 erect stems of 2 feet or so, which carry heads of blossom even inferior 

 to those of P. valderia, with the sepals and petals alike a great deal 

 more starved into strips. (Rocky places in the Balkans.) 



P. Hippiana, from America, has pinnate silvery leaves, and yellow 

 flowers on 6-inch stems ; not a species of outstanding merit. 



P. hirta is tall and rather coarse and worthless, with yellow flowers, 

 on stalks of nearly 2 feet high, from June till August. 



P. intermedia stands close to P. pyrenaica, but the leaves have 

 seven lobes and are on specially long foot-stalks. 



P. lanuginosa makes a curling, quirling, tangled bush like P. 

 dahurica, very slow indeed in growth, but attaining with years to 

 some 2 feet or so. It shines with lovely leafage of silky -woolly silver, 

 and has large golden blossoms late in the summer. 



P. Leschenaultiana is hardly worth the lockjaw provoked by its 

 name, for it is a large robust and coarse weed from India. 



P. libanotica forms trunky masses in the limestone cliffs of Lebanon ; 

 a glandular-hairy thing, with the whitish flowers serried in a corymb, 

 and their petals longer than the calyx. 



P. microphylla is a variable Himalayan species, of which the high- 

 alpine forms have distinct charm, for they are so massed and minute 

 that the little feather-lobed leaves are indecipherable, and on the 

 hard lichenous mass the solitary golden stars sit almost close. 



P. minima has no merit at all. Its microscopic flowers are yellow. 

 P. montenegrina grows a foot high, but also has yellow flowers. 

 P. Mooniana has the notoriety of little worth ; sprays of profuse 

 tiny yellow stars all through the later summer. 



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