[ H3 ] 



OXALIS ELEGANS. 



Elegant Wood-sorrel. 

 Liunean Class— Decandria. Order— PentaGYNIA. Natural Order— Oxalidacej!. 



In our first number, we gave a figure of a very pretty species of Wood-sorrel, and 

 promised to return to the genus. The Oxalis eernm then published, was offered 

 as an interesting spring-flowering bulb for the window ; the 0. elegam now figured, 

 iB an example selected from the summer-flowering species. 



In common with most of its congeners, it is produced from a bulb of small 

 dimensions, and appears likely to prove nearly, if not quite, hardy. The leaflets 

 are bluntly triangular, generally of a pale green beneath, but, in some plants, of a 

 bright reddish purple. Judging from our own specimen, we should infer that both 

 varieties of foliage may be found on the same plant. The leaves are less numerous 

 than in the 0. cernua, and some others ; but in the case of full-sized bulbs, are 

 much larger than in many of the species. The flower scape is about twice the 

 length of the petiole, supporting a truss of from six to ten blossoms, of a purple 

 colour, the eye of the flower being of a very intense shade. 



The sepals, or divisions of the calyx, are remarkable for four minute linear glands 

 of an orange tint, at their tips, which, although too small to be readily detected by 

 the unassisted eye, are easily perceptible under a microscope of low power, such as 

 the Stanhope or Codrington lens. These glands form an excellent mark of dis- 

 tinction. 



As in all the species, the petals are twisted in the bud, and form, when expanded, 

 a flat-limbed corolla. The stamens of this, as well as of all the Oxalises, are ten in 

 number, the five alternate ones being shorter than the others, and all are united at their 

 bases by the dilated filaments. The five longest of these have frequently a broad 

 scale at their base ; but this is absent in some specimens. An examination of the 

 uncoloured figure at the side of the plate, will afford an excellent idea of the 

 arrangement of these central organs, not only of the flower of the Oxalis elegam, 

 but also of most of the other species. The five styles, it will be observed, are 

 longer than the stamens, slightly hairy, and terminated l.y an enlarged stigma, with 

 a central depression, or, as it is technically termed, umhilicate. In many species of 

 Jifl the styles arc recurved laterally about the period that the pollen is ripe, but 

 afterwards assume the erect position of those in the diagram. As the styles are not 



