Tin: liOCK-ROJSE Tin ME. Jl 



frosts, and all the summer long are every morning 

 adorned with an inconceivable profusion of night- 

 born blossoms, which drink in with avidity the first 

 rays of the sun, but, after a few hours, perish beneath 

 his fervid rays. The colours of these blossoms are yel- 

 low, or yellow spotted with deep brown, purple, rose- 

 colour, white spotted with purple, or the most pure 

 and dazzling white. The leaves, moreover, of the 

 Cistuses give out a delicious balsamic odour, which, 

 in places where the plants are numerous, literally fills 

 the air, especially after a shower, with a slight, but 

 most agreeable and reviving fragrance. In their native 

 countries, particularly in the south of France, Spain, 

 and the Islands of the Mediterranean, the Cistuses 

 are by far the most lovely objects that Nature has 

 planted in the woods, rocks, and other stations they 

 inhabit. 



In their foliage they are not sufficiently uniform for 

 the leaves to form a part of their distinctive character, 

 which in this instance is derived principally from the 

 fructification. The purple Rock-Rose (Cistus purpu- 

 reus) will give you a good example of it. 



In that species you have a calyx composed of five 

 pieces {fig. 2.), which, however, do not exactly forma 

 single row or whorl ; but, as you may see by tearing 

 them off, two {fig- 2. a. a.) grow a very little lower 

 down than the three others, which, moreover, are some- 

 thing larger and a little paler at the edges ; such a 

 calyx is said to form a broken whorl. The corolla {fig. 

 1.) consists of five equal purple petals, which, from the 

 manner in which they are packed up within the bud, 



