18G1.] BOTANY OF SPAIN. 299 



south of Europe, Sideritis roniana ; Salvia clandestina (other- 

 wise liorminoides) , an ally of /S\ varbenaca ; Micromer'ia graca, one 

 of a small-leaved, wiry genus, detached from Satureia, and 

 characteristic of the extreme south of Europe ; and, last of all, 

 the magnificent Phlomis Lychnites, covered with a grey down all 

 over, except the large bright-yeliow flowers. This genus counts, 

 1 believe, only three European species, which are at the head of 

 European Labiata in the size and brilliancy combined with the 

 multitude of their flowers. One of the species, P. Herba-venti, 

 is widely and rather concisely branched, forming, though herba- 

 ceous, a kind of small bush ; it is found at Montpellier and other 

 places in the south of France. Our species, P. Lychnites, has a 

 simple stem, with great whorls of flowers, like those of the taller 

 and still more magnificent ornament of Sicily and Greece, P. 

 fruticosa. The ^/?e^«/<e I noticed \icve Euphoi'bia flavicoma, digi- 

 talis, and Par-alias (the last not yet in flower) ; an Urtica of the 

 pilulifera section, possibly pilulifera itself, which I did not stop 

 to determine ; and the picturesque Passerina hirsuta, not a beach 

 plant, but seldom or never found far from the sea, and which 

 in February hangs in profusion from the clifls of Bagnoli, on the 

 appi'oach to Pozzuoli from Naples. Of Monocotyledonous plants 

 the handsomest I saw, except the Gladiolus, was a plant looking 

 like a Scilla or Hyacinthus, and with small pendent flowers, of 

 a bluish colour (if I remember right) while growing, but turning 

 red in drying. The petals, which are united at the base, consist 

 of three shorter and broader, alteiniating with and included 

 within the same number of longer. This I decided to be Uro- 

 petalum serotinum {Lachenalia sej'otina o^ some authors). I found 

 but one specimen. A more singular plant was an Asparagus, of 

 which more hereafter. These, with Juricus acutus, on wet ground 

 near the sea, and two grasses, Gaslridium lendigerum and the 

 beautiful Lamar ckia aurea (which, in spite of its name, is, at least 

 until withered, rather silvery than golden), complete the record 

 of the best and richest herborization (that of Monserrat excepted) 

 which I have made on Spanish soil. Properly however it was 

 not one, but two herborizations on the same ground, at an interval, 

 of about a fortnight. 



From each of the other centres at which I halted in my 

 journey, I made but one botanizing expedition. The results 

 however were not without interest. 



