84 FAMILIAR WILL FLOWERS. 



in vigorous life and cohered with blossoms, and barely 

 a foot high altogether. The stems and leaves are 

 often thickly clothed with soft hair. The leaves are all 

 borne on long stalks, and are divided into five or seven 

 broad and rounded lobes. The outline is serrate. The 

 flowers grow in clusters of half a dozen or so from the 

 axils of the leaves. The petals are heart-shaped, reddish- 

 purple in colour, and veined by two or three rather 

 conspicuous lines of a darker tint of the same colour. 

 The flowers vary somewhat in strength of colour; in 

 some plants the tint is much deeper than in others, 

 but beyond this the plant is very little subject to any 

 great variation, and no difficulty, we imagine, will 

 ever be felt by any of our readers in its identification. 

 The plant is often called the marsh mallow in country 

 districts. The marsh mallow is, however, another and 

 much less common plant, and we can only conclude that 

 "apt alliteration's artful aid" has exercised a certain 

 fascination, and has in this case, at least, proved a snare. 



