124 WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



From Transcaucasia. 5. The plant contributed under this heading 

 has reddish-brown glabrous stems, twigs, petioles, &c., the inflor- 

 escence pronounced lateral shoots bearing three to five leaves and 

 flowers, the first internode being 3-6 inches long, the whole plant 

 glabrous, and the leaves with five deltoid tapering lobes that strongly 

 recall the variety himalayana (see Plate No. 16). It is thus very 

 possibly a hybrid cotton, an opinion that would seem confirmed by 

 the examination of its pollen-grains. 



Supposed From India. 6. A sample said to be Garo Hill cotton. There 

 cotton must have been some mistake, however, in the seed supplied, as the 

 plant in question is G. Nanking, Meyen, var. Bani (cf. p. Ill, 

 remarks under assamica). In shape of leaf this has come up closer, 

 perhaps, to the true Chinese form than is customary in India 

 a consequence, possibly, of the superior cultivation to which it has 

 been subjected ; but it has nevertheless preserved in the altered 

 environment all the characteristics of the plant as named and 

 described by me. The whole plant (stems, leaves, &c.) is softly 

 pilose-tomentose, and the bracteoles ovate acute, 3-toothed. It 

 manifests, in other words, no trace of its supposed Garo origin, 

 hence, if the seed supplied was drawn from the so-called acclimatised 

 stock of Nagpur, it has reverted to the elder parent the bani of 

 Berar. 



An extensive acquaintance with the cultivated cottons of China, 

 Japan, Siam, the Malaya, &c., as also of Africa, will in the future 

 doubtless suggest other varietal or racial groups in amplification of 

 the more or less Indian series that may be here detailed, but nothing, 

 I confidently believe, will be discovered to upset the main contention 

 that they can be assorted under G. Nanking, Meyen. 



16. Var. himalayana, Watt. 



The whole plant often hairy ; leaves large, broad, the lobes tri- 

 angular acuminate, and the base hardly cordate ; flowers large, 

 yellow (see Plate No. 16). 



Descrip- A. herbaceous annual or perennial, cultivated in warm temperate tracts. 



tion. In the Indian form the leaves are large, lobes triangular acuminate (f. 1), 



the whole plant frequently very hairy a departure from the type that 

 possibly denotes hybridisation with G. obtusifoliiwn. In fact, at first sight 

 this might be mistaken for one of the forms of G. obtusifoUum. Indeed, 

 nearly all the specimens in Herbaria which I have placed in this position were 

 found by me bearing the name G. herbaceum, Linn., or G. Wightianum, 

 Tod. They are, however, as a rule much less hairy than G. obtusifolium, 

 and in texture and tomentum are nearer the true G. herbaceum, Linn., 



