THE CHEDDAR PINK 233 



or less cogent significance. All that is wanted, they 

 declare, is a distinctive title, and so then Trianthus 

 or Antrithus would be equally acceptable. 



The maiden pink is a perennial ; when we have 

 once started it, if we have reasonably good fortune, 

 we shall find it springing up year after year. The 

 leaves form a tuft from which the flowering stems 

 ascend. Unlike most pinks the flowers are scent- 

 less, occurring either singly or in pairs. It is a 

 plant of the dry banks throughout much of Europe 

 and Western Asia, and is generally distributed over 

 Britain, though in many localities it is unknown. 

 It occasionally varies to Ahite flowers. 



The Dianthus cczsius, or Cheddar pink, figured 

 by us on Plate XXXII., has noble flowers of a rosy- 

 red tint, and of fragrant odour. The lower leaves 

 are thickly crowded together, glaucous in tint, and 

 only an inch or so in length, while the flower-stems 

 may be anything from five inches to a foot, the 

 latter, however, being an unusual length. The 

 stems often bear but a single flower, but at times, as 

 in our example, throw out laterals. The plant is 

 found, and that but very locally, on limestone rocks 

 and old stone walls, in South, West, and Central 

 Europe, while in England we have, in its truly wild 

 state, but one station for it the magnificent mass of 

 limestone of the Cheddar cliffs in Somersetshire. 

 Names implying geographical distribution, as a rule, 

 are not very happy. Few plants or insects, such as 



