248 WILD AND CULTIVATED COTTONS 



Novelty The novelty of the naked seed thus appears synchronous with the 



seeT ' publication by botanical authors of the species that are now regarded 

 as alone possessing that peculiarity. It was accordingly customary 

 for the early writers to speak of the green and of the black seeded 

 cottons. And this subject seems to have continued to arouse atten- 

 tion for some considerable time, or until Dr. Buchanan-Hamilton 

 seriously proposed a botanical classification of the cottons of the 

 world into (a) album, white or fuzzy-seeded, and (b) nigrum, black 

 or naked-seeded cottons. 



To the breeder of new stocks the importance of the naked-seeded 

 forms with readily separable silky flosses cannot be over-stated. 



37. 0. TATTENSE, Part., Sp. del Cot. (1866) p. 39 t. vi., /. A ; 

 G. EELIGIOSUM, Solander in Seem., Fl. Vit. 1865, p. 22 ; also 

 Seem., Journ. Bot. (1866), p. 268-70 ; G. TAITENSE, Tod., Belaz. 

 Cult, del Cot. p. 195 ; G. BELIGIOSUM, Hilleb., Fl. Hawaiian Isl. 

 1888, p. 51 ; G. TAITENSE, Vesque, Trait, de Bot. Agri. et Indust., 

 476 ; Aliotta, Eiv. Crit. Gen. Goss. 1903,^. 95. 



Wild cotton of Polynesia. 



Descrip- This species may be recognised by the following characters, 



when taken collectively : An erect, straggling bush, when mature, 

 glabrescent and purplish-green, but with the younger parts occasion- 

 ally more or less ciliated, through the presence of long, weak hairs ; 

 leaves, ovate-oblong to sub-rotund, scarcely cordate, acute or 

 acuminate, entire, irregularly angled or having three ascending lobes 

 on the upper third, uniglandular ; bracteoles usually quite free to the 

 base, nearly as long as the corolla, ovate oblong, acute, deeply 

 auricled, also laciniated into long, narrow fimbriated teeth ; calyx 

 cup-shaped, ending in 5 ovate oblong, acuminate or even awl-shaped 

 and usually fimbriated teeth, veins three to each sepal, glands large, 

 alternating with the bracteoles ; seeds rotund, not angled nor 

 pointed, and having a very imperfect fuzz (or entirely naked), and 

 a rusty floss which cannot be handled without separating from the 

 seeds. (See Plate No. 43.) 



In its mature state this plant often looks quite glabrous, smooth, and 

 polished ; twigs angled, purplish-green, very minutely gland-warted, woody, 

 with short much branched terminal shoots. Leaves minutely dotted, often 

 almost reniform, truncate below (but only very faintly cordate), entire or 

 irregularly angled and lobed, or with three, very rarely five, deltoid acute 

 lobes, the two laterals pointing upwards (only very slightly arching out- 

 wards) and the central lobe not much longer than the laterals, the leaf being 



