408 23. GERANIUM ROTUNDirOLlUM. [CL. XVI. 



both sides with the same soft shaggy hairs. The upper leaves 

 are more broad than long, so that they are almost reniform ; 

 they have no indentation at the base, but sometimes they ta- 

 per into a wide shape, sometimes they are directly truncated. 

 Their circumference is also divided into five obtuse lobes, 

 standing at some distance from each other, and furnished 

 with three obtuse teeth : their surfaces also are hairy. In 

 the neighbourhood of the flowers the leaves are frequently 

 three-lobed. Their size varies, the lowermost having a diameter 

 of an inch and a half, the uppermost of scarcely half an inch. 

 Opposite to the leaf-stalks, and higher up even between the 

 leaf-stalks, appear the flower-stalks, likewise an inch long. 

 They stand erect, or open, and are divided, half way their 

 length, into two distinct stalks, under which two fine, white, 

 pointed bractca?, or stipulre, stand. The calyx consists of five 

 oblong, pointed, streaked, strongly cihated pieces. The 

 flower consists of five spoon-shaped, pale red, quite entire pe- 

 tals, the claws of which are ciliated at the base : they are ra- 

 ther longer than the calyx. In the bottom of the latter stand 

 ten filaments, enlarged at the base, and clinging to one ano- 

 ther. On their outer side we perceive five nectaries, covered 

 by the cilia? of the petals. The antheras are reddish, and 

 contain a yellow, oval pollen, surrounded by three circles. 

 In the middle of the filarhents rises the pistillum, inclosed by 

 the five, rostrate, connate, shaggy appendages of the germen. 

 At its summit, the pistillum is expanded into a five-lobed, 

 reddish stigma. After the fall of the flower, five ciliated, but 

 not bunchy or wrinkled utriculi, remain, which open laterally 

 from below upwards, and whose beaks are externally set 

 with the same parallel white liairs which cover the whole 

 plant. The spotted, or warty seed, contains the embryon 

 without albumen, with convoluted, membranaceous cotyle- 

 dons, and the radicle turned upwards. 



Diagnosis and Affinity. 



This plant is most nearly related to Geranium molle and 

 puhiUum. But the former of tliese two is distinguished by 

 its cleft, or dcej)ly cmargined })ctals, and by its wrinkled ulri- 



