TORENIAS 439 



pot-culture in the conservatory or cool gTsenhouse. A suitable compost 

 for them may be compounded as follows : take of good loam two parts, of 

 leaf -mould one part, and of cow-manure one part ; well mix. The minute 

 seeds should be sprinkled on the surface of pans of loam and leaf -mould 

 to which a little sand has been added. The pans should be watered 

 before sowing the seed, and covered with a sheet of glass afterwards 

 to maintain the moisture. The seedlings should be pricked out when 

 about an inch high, and afterwards potted singly or planted out in the 

 open borders. The herbaceous perennials die down in autumn, but their 

 white creeping underground stems fill the soil, and these may be separated, 

 broken up, and the portions separately planted early in spring. They 

 will be found useful for covering the soil in beds where such tall-growing 

 subjects as Gladioli are grown, but they should be replanted in fresh soil 

 about every third year. 

 Description of Harlequin Monkey Flower, Mimulus liiteus var. 



Plate 212. variegatus. Several different mottlings are shown. Fig. 

 1 is a section through a flower ; 2, the seed, natural size and enlarged ; 3, 

 a seedling. 



TORENIAS 



Natural Order Scrophularine^. Genus Tm-enia 



ToRENiA (named in honour of Rev. Olaf Toren, a Swedish botanist). A 

 genus consisting of about sixteen species of stove herbs, with opposite 

 leaves and tubular flowers in few-flowered racemes. The calyx is tubular, 

 three- to five-toothed or two-lipped, with wings or plaits. Corolla-tube 

 cylindrical, enlarged above ; upper lip broad, notched or divided ; lower 

 lip of three broad spreading, nearly equal lobes. There are four perfect 

 stamens. The oblong capsule is hidden within the calyx. The species 

 are scattered over the Tropical Regions of the Old World, and one of them 

 is also found in South America, where, however, it is thought probable 

 it has been introduced at some time. 



Very few species of Torenia are in cultivation, and 

 these have all been introduced during the present century. 

 T. asiatica was discovered growing in China by Olaf Toren, whose name 

 it bears, about a hundred years before its introduction to Britain from 

 India in 1845. In the same year came T. peduncularis from India, and 

 the year previous T. concolat' had been introduced from China. But the 

 first species we received was really T. cmxlifolia from India in 1811. 

 Others known in our gardens are of much more recent introduction 



