273 



N. Ord. IRIDACE^:. Lindl.,Yeg. K., p. 159 ; Le Maout &] Dec.,p. 782. 

 Tribe Iridece. 



Genus Iris,* Linn. Klatt, in Linnsea, xxxiv (1865), p. 603. 

 Species about 70, natives of temperate and subtropical 

 regions in both hemispheres. 



273. Iris florentina, Linn., 8p. PL, ed. 2, p. 55 (1762). 



White Flag. 



Figures. Steph. & Oh., i, t. 27 ; Nees, t. 56 ; Hayne, xii, t. 1 ; Berg & 

 Sch., t, 10 f; Bot. Mag., t. 671; PI. Grseca, t. 39; Redoute, Liliac., 

 t. 23; Reich., Ic. PL Germ., ix, t. 339. 



Description. A perennial, with a thick, fleshy, nearly cylindrical, 

 pale yellowish-brown rhizome, creeping at or just below the surface 

 of the soil, and reaching a foot or more in length, sometimes 

 branching ; each year's growth marked by a contraction so that 

 the rhizome has a jointed appearance, giving off thick fibrous 

 roots below and marked by the scars of the leaf -attachments. 

 Leaves several in each bud on the last year's growth of the 

 rhizome, a foot or more long, an inch or more wide, clear, pale 

 rather glaucous green, parallel- veined, sword- shaped, acute, equi- 

 tantly sheathing below. Flowering- stem (scape) much exceeding 

 the leaves, cylindrical, solid, faintly striate, stiff, with 2 or 3 

 branches, each from the axil of a sheathing semi-leafy bract. 

 Flowers large, solitary, at the end of the stem and branches, each 

 surrounded by two bracts (spathe), one longer than the other, 

 green at their lower part, pale brown and scarious above. Perianth 

 epigynous, tubular below, tube about an inch long, thick, pale 

 green, divided above into 6 large white, obovate-spathulate, 

 waved, and crumpled segments, the 3 outer somewhat narrower, 

 elegantly recurved, bearing on the middle line of the upper 

 surface at the base a band of densely set filaments, white 

 with bright yellow tips, on either side of which are branched, 



* Iris, the rainbow Goddess, from the beauty and variety of colour in the 

 flowers of the genus. 



