290 SYNOPSIS OF GENERA AND SPECIES OF MALVEJS. 



specific rank/' This, however, I should scarcely have ventured to 



do, had not the constancy of the characters relied on been severely 

 tested by cultivation under circumstances wholly unlike the natural 

 ones. Boots which were sent home, four years ago, fortunately 

 survived, and have flowered for two successive seasons. Poly- 

 morphic as R. Flammida is, the variations do not appear to be 

 permanent ; var. radicans Nolte, perhaps the most marked of them 

 all, was at once found by Mr. Beeby to revert to the type, when 

 grown in a pot. R. petiolaris, on the contrary, though (like most 

 psrennial wild flowers) somewhat modified by the richer and drier 

 soil of an ordinary garden -border, has retained its peculiarities in a 

 very high degree ; the root-leaves showing no appreciable change, 

 and those of the stem only becoming a little coarser and larger in 

 the blade. The stems are weaker, and eventually prostrate ; small 

 plants, with the curious radical leaves characteristic of this species, 

 being formed by nodal rooting. As it is unable to mature seed 

 under the altered conditions of existence, the plant is thus special- 

 ised, and enabled to hold its own. 



Explanation of PiiATE 328. — 1. Ranunculus petiolaris, flowering (a small 

 specimen, with most of the root-leaves already detached). 2. Ditto, showing the 

 root-leaves as first developed in spring. 



SYNOPSIS OF GENERA AND SPECIES OF MALYEM. 



By Edmund G. Baker, F.L.S. 



(Continued from p. 240.) 



K Caules erecti ? Folia suborbicularia supra rufescentia basi 

 cuneata. Carpella ? 



p. 53. 



SUBORBICULARIS 



* • • 



Hab. Brazil. Bio Grande do Sul ! 



/x. Caules prostrati. Folia parva discolora ovata basi rotundata. 



Carpella 5-7. 



MICROPHYLLA 



p. 15. 8. parvift 



licift 



Hab. India ! Bourbon. Polynesia ! Pescadores Is. ! 



67. S. Vescoana Baill. in Bull. Soc. Lin. Par. 1885, p. 504. 

 Hab, Madagascar. Port Leven, M. Vesco I 



68. S. nummularia, sp. n. — Caulibus prostratis ligneis, foliis 

 ovatis parvis serratis discoloris supra nigrescentibus subtus cane- 

 seentibus petiolatis, stipulis parvis linearibus, calyce angulato 

 sepalis ovatis acuminatis, petalis luteis calyce longioribus, carpellis 

 6 muticis dehiscentibus. 



Hab. Isle of Pines ! Milne. Herb. Kew. 



Branches 7-9 in. long; leaves i-£ in. ; sepals j in. long. 



