CONVOLVULUS ITALICUS. 



165 



whether fragrant or not, we are at present unaware. This species, too, may be 

 pronounced perfectly hardy; plants of it having borne the severe winter and 

 spring of 1853, with little or no injury. Grows as tall as revolution. 



The J. chrysanthum is another Himalayan plant of the genus, with persistant 

 tcrnate or quinate foliage, and yellow flowers produced in small umbels at the 

 extremity of the young wood ; we believe they are either scentless, or with but 

 a very slight degree of fragrance ; the plant is, however, somewhat rare at present, 

 and has not yet come under our own observation. The J. Reevesii is, we think, 

 but a synonyme of this species. To these we may add the J. ochroleucum, a plant 

 resembling the common white J. officinale, but with larger flowers of a yellowish 

 white tint; whether this is a distinct species, or a hybrid between the white 

 and one of the yellow ones, we are unable to learn. The whole of the plants 

 we have named are of easy cultivation, and readily increased by cuttings and 

 layers. 



The scientific name of this genus, as well as its more popular one, is said to be 

 derived from the Arabic ysmyn. The older English form, Jessamine, is one of the 

 most musical of our floral appellations, certainly more so than the modern 

 Jasmine. 



CONVOLVULUS ITALICUS. 



Italian Convolvulus. 

 I.inncan Class— Pentandria. Order— Monogtoia. Natural Order— Convolvtjlaceje. 



The splendour of the flowers of many of the Convolvulacea cannot but excite a 

 regret that the majority should require, for their successful treatment, a higher 

 temperature than can be obtained in the open air in this country. But, although 

 the hardier members of the tribe are undoubtedly eclipsed, both in numbers and 

 beauty, by the tropical species, they nevertheless include some highly interesting 

 subjects, which nothing but the ivndeserved neglect with which our hardy plants 

 arc treated by most Florists can have prevented from becoming universally 

 diffused. The pretty annual Convolvulus tricolor; the Pharlitis hispida, better 

 known by its popular name of Major Convolvulus ; the great Bindweed, Calyste 

 gias&pium, and the double Chinese Bindweed, C. pubescens, are all that can be 

 6aid to be at all common, out of at least twenty or thirty species more or less 

 available. The perennial section of the genus Convolvulus especially affords 



