74 WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



del Cot., 132 ; G. OBTUSIFOLIUM, Stocks (non. Boxb.), MS. name 

 in Herb. Kew ; Boyle, Cotton in India, 1851, 144 ; Dalz. & 

 Gib., Bomb. FL, 21 ; G. HERBACEUM, Aliotta, Rev. Grit. Gen. 

 Goss. 1903 (in part), 70, 104; Gammie, The Indian Cottons, 

 1905, 2. 



Sind (Karachi) and Dhofar Wild Cottons. 



Descrip- Perennial shrub ; leaves thick, leather)-, matted with stellate hairs, 



deeply cordate, with 5, more rarely 3, obtuse (almost rounded) 

 mucronate lobes, or still more rarely simple (ff. 1 and 3) ; veins 

 eglandular ; bracteoles quite free, clawed and attached to the bottom 

 of the calyx-tube, ovate oblong, deeply gashed (ff. 4 and 5) ; calyx 

 tomentose, campanulate, prominently 5-toothed, rounded and bristle- 

 tipped, also 15-veined (ff. 5 and 2) ; seeds closely compacted together, 

 but not united (ff. 7 and 8), coated with a rich golden fuzz not 

 referable to two layers (f. 9), though after being torn away the 

 surface of the seed seems as if felted with a minute wool. (See Plate 

 No. 6.) 



A small perennial, tufted or much branched, woody shrub, with thin 

 straight, round, sub-glabrous, and almost non-gland-dotted woody branches. 

 Leaves usually not more tban 1 inch each way, deeply cordate and auricled, 

 one half segmented into 5, more rarely 3 lobes, or simple ; when young, the 

 twigs, leaves, and inflorescences are of a greyish-green colour, owing to 

 being matted with stellate hairs (less so with maturity), lobes ovate-rotund, 

 obtuse, apiculate, broader than long, and constricted below into the very 

 narrow sinus ; veins and^ reticulations prominent, the midrib extending 

 right into the sub-spinose apex, margins thick, and more or less reflexed, 

 veins eglandular, texture thick, leathery, drying (in herbaria specimens) into 

 the grey-green colour characteristic of G. herbaceum, Linn. ; stipules 

 minute, falcate, caducous. Inflorescence on lateral axillary shoots, 1 to 

 2 inches long, arrested by the production of one or more flowers and a few 

 small leaves. Bracteoles 3, quite free from each other, tapering below into 

 thick prominent claws, inserted near the base of the calyx-tube and throwing 

 a thickening along the peduncle thus making it triquetrous, each bracteole 

 ovate-oblong to sub-rotund, acute, on the apex deeply segmented into 9 to 

 11 long teeth, the central segment usually much the longest and largest; 

 midribs of the teeth prominent, each sending a costal vein to the next above, 

 a little more than half the length of the corolla, accrescent, membranous, 

 sub -glabrous, embracing and enclosing the fruit (f. 2) ; a pair of minute 

 reddish-coloured glands are seen on the inner surface of each claw that 

 might be spoken of as stipular developments. Flmvers large, fully twice the 

 length of the bracteoles, yellow, gland-dotted, with faint irregular purple 

 spots on the claws, the older flowers having a pinkish tinge ; petals rotating 

 to right, firmly united by their claws, and in consequence forming a short 

 constricted tube, sparsely hairy on the outside ; calyx two-thirds length of 

 bracteoles, almost tomentose, campanulate, loose, prominently 5-toothed, the 



