CLASS xv. ORDER ii..] MATTHIOLA. 897 



This is the origin of the now well known and extensively cultivated 

 Stock, of which there is a great variety both of the single and double 

 flowers. It is an old inmate of the garden, and by ancient dames was 

 cultivated with great care at the baronial castle; hence it obtained 

 the name of Castle gillyflower. The varieties are classed according to 

 their colour, as the purple, red, white, and variegated, and of these there 

 are both double and semi-double. By cultivation variations are so 

 much increased both in the size of the plant and the flower, as to 

 appear more like a Rose than its original simple form. Few plants 

 are more showy and more elegant as a border flower; they are easy of 

 cultivation, and continue flowering a considerable lime. Besides this 

 species there are commonly cultivated the M. annua, or Ten-week 

 Stock, a native of the South of Europe, the M. yreeca, the Wallflower- 

 leaved, and the M. fenestralis, the Window Stock, and others. The 

 fragrance which some of the flowers exhale is much enjoyed by most 

 people ; but if the flowers are kept in a close room it is too powerful, 

 and causes a disagreeable head-ache. From the beauty of the flowers 

 and their long continuance, the stock in the emblematic language of 

 flowers is the sign of lasting beauty. 



2. M. sinua'ta, Brown. (Fig. 1036.) Great Sea Stock. Stem 

 herbaceous, spreading, branched ; leaves oblong, downy, the lower 

 ones sinuated ; siliqua compressed, downy and rough, with glands. 



English Flora, vol. iii. p. 206. Hooker, British Flora, ed. 4. vol. i. 

 p. 255. Lindley, Synopsis, p. 22. Cheiranthus sinuatus, Linn. 

 English Botany, t. 462. 



Root tapering, and with branched fibres. Stem herbaceous, 

 branched, spreading, round, leafy, and as well as the whole plant 

 clothed with woolly pubescence, and more or less profusely scattered 

 over with rigid glandular hairs. Leaves oblong, tapering at the base 

 iulo a stout footstalk, the upper ones mostly entire, the lower sinuated. 

 Inflorescence a terminal sub-corymbose cluster, becoming much 

 elongated after flowering. Calyx of four linear pieces, two opposite 

 ones swollen at the base. Corolla of four broadly ovate notched 

 petals, of a dingy purple colour, the claw long, narrow, yellow. 

 Stamens with awl-shaped fllaments and yellow two celled oblong 

 anthers. Fruit a compressed siliqua, two or three inches long, clothed 

 with soft pubescence and rigid glandular hairs, crowned by the two 

 lobed stigma, each lobe having at the back a broad obtuse scale. 

 Seeds numerous in each cell, flat, with a pale membranous margin. 

 Cotyledons accumbent. 



Habitat. Sandy sea coasts of Wales, and Cornwall, Jersey, and 

 Guernsey. 



Biennial ; flowering from May to August. 



The fragrance of the flowers of this species appears much more 

 Tolatile than that of the last ; it has scarcely any scent during the day, 



