934 



Characters of several new species of Compositae ;" by George Gar- 

 dener, Esq. 



Among the above enumerated papers, that which recoi'ds the dis- 

 covery of the Malva verlicillata in Wales, may be supposed of most 

 interest to British botanists generally. From the " infoi-mation " 

 given in the Join-nal, it appears that the Malva in question was dis- 

 covered in a corn-field at Llanelly, in Glamorganshire, by Mr. James 

 Motley, in 1845 ; only very few specimens being found. Mr. Borrer 

 has raised the plant in his garden, from the "wild" seed; and he com- 

 municated examples of the wild and garden states to Sir W. J. 

 Hooker. Both these distinguished botanists have thus had before 

 them the necessary data for determining the species ; and as some 

 degree of unceilainty nevertheless still remains, we shall make a few 

 extracts from their remarks and descriptions. 



" Mr. Borrer had the kindness to communicate to me," writes Sir 

 William, " a small wild specimen from the field at Llanelly, and one 

 about twice the size, raised from wild seed, and of which about the 

 upper three-fourths of the plant is here represented. The most re- 

 markable characteristic of the species is the absence of margin (or 

 angle to the margins) to the carpels, so that there are deep grooves 

 or channels, as it were, between them, and they only seem to touch 

 or unite at the axis of the entire fruit. There is, further, a slightly 

 elevated dorsal line on each cai'pel, and lines radiating at the sides 

 from the axis and extending to the rounded margins. In my own 

 rich herbarium I could not at first detect the species, and was on the 

 point of publishing it as new, when, on examining carefully the fruit 

 of Malva verticillata in the Linnean herbarium, I did not hesitate to 

 refer Mr. Motley's plant to it. The Linnean sample seems to be a 

 cultivated one, and China is the country given as the habitat. Native 

 wild specimens I have not seen ; but I possess the same species from 

 the Botanic Garden at Glasgow; and the * Malva microcarpa' of 

 Montbret, from Egypt, does not appear different. The M. verticil- 

 lata of Turczaninow, from Dahuria, in my herbarium, has no perfect 

 fruit ; Beruhardi has constituted of that a new M. pulchella. I am 

 happy to have my view of the identity of this plant with the Linnean 

 M. verticillata confirmed by so careful an observer as Mr. Borrer, 

 who writes thus," &c. 



" Although," adds Sir William, " the discovery of this mallow in 

 Wales has thus been, I trust, the means of enabling us in future bet- 

 ter to distinguish the species, I fear we must not venture to consider 

 it a native of Great Britain. It is not described even as naturahzed 



