168 



WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



Descrip. 



tion. 



Brazil. 



bracteoles, with many long, linear, ciliate teeth; seeds six in the 

 cells, large and coarse, with both fuzz and floss, rust-coloured. 

 (See Plate, No. 26). 



Bushy perennial, with the branches stout woody, the twigs 3-furrowed, 

 twisted and, like the leaves, covered with short, adpressed, hoary, granular 

 pubescence. Leaves (recalling Jatropha Curcas) very thick in texture, 

 deeply cordate, 3-lobed, 3 inches long, to tip of central lobe, by 4 to 5 inches 

 in diameter from tip to tip of the lateral lobes ; lobes approximately ovate, 

 acute mucronate, and margins ciliate ; centre lobe ovate-oblong acuminate, 

 up to 2 inches in breadth at the base ; when young densely matted with 

 stellate, often clustered hairs, the upper surface (except the veins) becoming 

 sub -glabrous, and drying into a deep brown colour in the herbarium, and 

 indistinctly black-dotted ; sinus sometimes thrown up in a fold ; glands one 

 or more irregular slits rather than definite glands; stipules large, erect, 

 caducous ; petiole rounded, densely tomentose, and hah* shorter than the 

 blade. Inflorescence long, many-flowered shoots, the first joint being at 

 least twice the length of the petioles; pedicels shorter than the petioles, 

 erect, densely tomentose, with black gland dots; bracteoles ovate oblong, 

 free, deeply (almost tail-) toothed throughout, the lowest pair more or less 

 thrown across the cordature ; glands on the apex of the pedicles obscure or 

 absent. Flowers longer than the bracteoles, petals pilose, yellow tinged 

 with purple ; calyx loose campanulate, nearly glabrous ciliate on the margin, 

 many- veined, cut square across, and possessed of small but distinct glands. 

 Young fruit not much elongated, but considerably beaked, and composed of 

 three tapering walls prominently reticulated, 3-celled ; seeds six in each cell, 

 2-seriate, coarsely formed, fuzz copious and like the wool, rufous-coloured ; 

 wool not abundant, soft, silky. 



Habitat. Brazil (Crato, Ceara), and Colombia. 



Citation of Specimens. There are excellent samples of this plant 

 in the British Museum, in the Kew and Cambridge University Herbaria, 

 all collected at Ceara, Brazil, by Gardner, in 1838, n. 1,463, and stated by 

 him to have been found in the woods ; it recalls very forcibly G. tomentosum. 

 A second specimen of what I take to be this plant was collected by J. F. 

 Button in April 1853, n. 749, in Colombia (' Flora Neogranadina Caucana 

 (La Paila) ') 



27. G. PUNCTATUM, Sch. et Thon., BesJcr. Guin. PZ.(1827), p. 309- 

 10 ; Curagao Cotton, Eohr, Obs. sur la Cult, du Cot. 1807, pp. 47- 

 50 ; Columbia Island Cotton, Koster, Travels in Brazil, 1816, p. 

 368, footnote ; G. PUNCTATUM, Cfuillemin, Perrottet and Richard, 

 Fl. Senegamb. i. (1830), pp. 62-63 ; 6. JAMAICENSE, Mac/., Fl. 

 Jam. (1837) i. 73 ; G. PUNCTATUM, Leper, et Perr., Samuel 

 Brunner, Ergebnisse, Senegambia Botan. Zeitung, 1840, i., pt. 2, 

 p. 75 ; G. BABBADENSE, Hook and Arn. t in Fl. Beechey's Voy. 

 (Mexico 1837), published 1841, p. 411; G. NIGBUM, VAB. PUNC- 



