WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



Definition 

 of Gossy- 

 pium. 



Bracteoles 



and 



Bractlets. 



Their 

 position. 



Gossypium, Thurberia, Thespesia, and Fugosia (Cienfuegosia). I have 

 excluded from Gossypium a few of the plants treated by Todaro as 

 Gossypia, but it seems possible a further distribution and assortment 

 may be found necessary. Even as it stands the diagnostic characters, 

 usually accepted as denoting Gossypium, are by no means of 

 constant application. The following, for example, may be given 

 as indicating the chief points brought out by Bentham and Hooker 

 ('Gen. PI.' i., 209) and following them by other more recent 

 authors : 



Bracteoles three, large, cordate. Calyx truncate or shortly 5-toothecL 

 Stamina]* column bearing indefinite filaments, below naked or more rarely 

 with anthers to the actual apex. Ovary 5-locular, loculi with seeds in- 

 definite ; style clavate at the apex, with 5 furrows and 5 stigmas. Capsule 

 with loculicidal dehiscence. Seeds subglobose or angular, densely woolly 

 or more rarely almost glabrous ; albumen thin, membranous or absent ; 

 cotyledons strongly folded, with auricles at the base enclosing the upright 

 radicle. Tall herbs or sub-arboreous shrubs. Leaves 3-9 lobed or more 

 rarely entire. Flowers rather large, yellow or purple. Bracteoles some- 

 times nigro-punctate, incised, toothed or entire. Cotyledons also sometimes 

 nigro-punctate. 



But it may be said that, even with the four genera above named, 

 such diversity exists in Gossypium alone as to almost destroy the 

 conceptions on which they have been founded. 



Specific Modifications. Thus, for example, the tendency towards 

 the formation of additional bracteoles (as in G. Sturtii) ; the forma- 

 tion of stipular bractlets (as in G. vitifolium, G. punctatum, &c.) ; the 

 existence of bracteoles not only in no way cordate but even provided 

 with distinct claws (as in G. Stocksii) ; the recognition of groups of 

 species in which in the one the bracteoles are entirely free from 

 each other, or in the other united together by their auriculate bases ; 

 lastly, the recurrence of quite entire bracteoles. These and such- 

 like extreme manifestations, every now and again met with in 

 the species of Gossypium, show the unsatisfactory nature of a 

 distinction based on the bracteoles, when employed to demarcate 

 the genus. It would almost seem as if a safer course would be 

 to regard the position of attachment of the bracteoles as more 

 valuable than their number or shape. Thus, for example, in 

 G. Sturtii, G. drynarioides and G. Stocksii the attachment might 

 be described as upon the calyx-tube and thus above the level of 

 the base of the ovary. In Thurberia the bracteoles are certainly 

 not cordate and differ in no respect from those in several plants 



